The US sub-prime mortgage crisis, which triggered a crash in global share prices including India, has "limited" impact for Asian banks due to their lower exposure in the American market, credit rating agency Moody's said on Friday.

However, smaller banks in Europe could see a major impact, even though the risk is manageable for larger banks in that region, it added.

On August 1, worries over crisis in the US sub-prime lending market - where loans are offered to borrowers who do not qualify for market interest rates because of poor credit history - sent global markets into a tailspin.

The Indian benchmark Sensex had recorded its third biggest fall in absolute terms and the biggest this fiscal as it tanked 615 points. On July 27, the market barometer had slipped 542 points also on US housing and credit crunch woes.

However, Moody's said that the role of Asia's investment banks in the US sub-prime market is generally limited to the purchase of the structured instruments as part of a large investment securities portfolio or of funds containing those securities.

The exposure of Asia's large commercial banks is also minimal, usually involving senior tranches and typically funded by stable deposits, the agency said in a report on the US crisis.

"Moody's therefore sees little risk of contagion," Moody's Asian Financial Institutions Group Senior Vice President and Regional Credit Officer Deborah Schuler said in a statement. The key Indian index has since recovered part of the losses and closed higher by 153 points at 15,138 on Friday.