The strengthened dollar has affected the three-month rally with regard to oil prices in Asia, with oil dropping below $72 on Monday. The fall in oil prices marks a retreat further from a high of more than eight months.

According to the statistics, benchmark crude for the month of July delivery tumbled 68 cents to $71.36 a barrel by twelve noon Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The 64 cents fall on Friday had brought the figures to settle at $72.04.

The rise in the dollar has cut into the commodity purchasing power of buyers who use other currencies, with investors- who buy crude and other commodities as a hedge against the likelihood of inflation - taking profits on non-dollar currencies that had soared to multi-month highs.

Saying that "Oil is still very strong given the weak overall fundamentals," energy analyst Victor Shum, at consultancy Purvin & Gertz in Singapore, said: "There's more talk in the market of expectations of a pullback in oil. It's rallied too much in too short a period of time."

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) on Friday revised downwards its day after day demand projections for 2009 by 230,000 barrels, predicting a shrinkage in the global consumption would to 83.8 million barrels per day.