Oil rises on weaker dollar, supply concerns

By Matthew Robinson

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oil rose on Monday on weakness in the U.S. dollar and concerns supplies could tighten as the United States and other consumer nations head into winter.

U.S. crude settled up 80 cents at $94.64 a barrel after striking $95.15 earlier. London Brent crude rose 66 cents to $92.28.

Oil has held close to the record $98.62 a barrel struck earlier this month, supported by worries of a supply shortfall during the Northern Hemisphere winter, a rise in speculative investment and the tumbling dollar.

A summit of the heads of state of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries ended on Sunday without strong signs as to whether the group will hike oil output to help ease high prices when it next meets on December 5 in Abu Dhabi.

During the OPEC summit, Venezuela and Iran -- both locked in diplomatic rows with Washington -- called for the cartel to take action to offset the falling greenback, which can eat away at revenues from dollar-denominated oil sales.

While OPEC did not mention the weak dollar in its final statement from the meeting, traders are looking for signals the group could seek higher prices to offset the fall.

"OPEC talk about prices being undervalued and its concern with the falling dollar are all filtering into the market," said Mark Pervan of ANZ Bank in Melbourne. "There are pockets of bullish news out in the market and no bearish news at all."

Talk that oil exporters could next month discuss abandoning their fixed exchange rates to the dollar helped push the dollar lower on Monday.