Trading in Indian shares is likely to be choppy in the week ahead amid worry over higher oil prices and nervousness as Mumbai's benchmark Sensex index flirts with the key 8,000 level, dealers said.
"The markets will continue to see fund flows in coming weeks. But this alone will not push indices up as there is little support buying from domestic funds and institutions," said a dealer with brokerage Jamnadas Morarjee.
"These high levels (for the index) clearly mean times of caution for retail investors. The markets will be volatile getting to the 8,000 mark and could slide sharply from these levels," a fund manager with Sahara Mutual fund said.
Dealers said sentiment would be dampened by rising oil prices which could depress steel and automobile stocks, but some mid-sized companies should remain in demand.
The Mumbai stock exchange's 30-share Sensex ended August 19 at 7,780.76, up 13.2 points over the previous Friday's close of 7,767.56.
The market crossed the 7,900 mark Thursday to hit a record intraday high of 7,921 on sustained foreign fund buying.
But sentiment then turned weaker on concern over rising oil prices that spurred profit-taking by funds and retail investors.
Overseas funds have bought a net 7.3 billion dollars worth of Indian shares in the January-August period compared with 3.8 billion dollars for the same year-earlier period, according to official figures.
Foreign funds net investments in India for calendar 2004 totalled 8.5 billion dollars.
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