Global banks scaled back cross-border lending to companies, governments and each other at the fastest rate since 2008 in the final quarter of last year, with lenders based in the euro area leading the way.

Lenders reporting to the Bank for International Settlements, the record-keeper of the world's central banks, shrank their cross-border assets by $799 billion, or 2.5 percent, in the three months ended Dec. 31, data released by the BIS show. The decline was the sharpest since the fourth quarter of 2008, when interbank lending markets froze worldwide following the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

“The decline was led by a significant drop in interbank lending arising from the spillover of the euro-area sovereign debt crisis to bank funding markets,” BIS said in its quarterly report. “The reduction was especially marked for cross-border claims on residents of the euro area and was mostly attributable to euro-area banks.”