Oil prices fell below $97 a barrel on Monday after Hurricane Ike inflicted minimal damage to oil installations on the Texas coast.

Light, sweet crude for October delivery declined $4.39 to $96.79 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by noon in Europe. The contract rose 31 cents on Friday to settle at $101.18 after dropping as low as $99.99 per barrel. Before that, the last time Nymex crude traded below the $100 mark was April 2...