10 things before the opening bell

Good morning, readers. Top economist Mohamed El-Erian doesn't recommend buying the dip right now, and President Biden gave an important update for the crypto sector. Oil has spiked again after falling on Wednesday.

Here we go.

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1. Don't buy the dip while there's a war going on in Ukraine. That's according to leading economist Mohamed El-Erian. After "buy the dip" became a mantra during the pandemic, investors now need to be cautious about rushing back in as the stock market whipsaws. As long as Russia continues to escalate its attack on Ukraine, markets will remain highly unpredictable.

"Unless investors can identify the so-far elusive Putin offramp, their heavily exposed equity positions would be better served by rationalizing them during the bounces rather than buying the current dip outright and hoping for the immediate initiation of a long rally," El-Erian said.

We talked yesterday about how retail traders have been consistently buying the dip amid the Ukraine conflict and how Bank of America sees this as a good sign, but El-Erian's advice is to be cautious and sit tight while uncertainty reigns.

If investors are following the famed economist's advice, they'll reshuffle their portfolios during a war-time market bounceback, and be more selective with stock picking as successful investing is far less certain in the current landscape.

In other news:

2. US futures are in the red ahead of key inflation data later. Oil is up sharply after the UAE appeared to back-track on a pledge to raise output, although the rally is far less spectacular than it was earlier the week. Here's the latest on the markets.

3. On the docket: IBI Group, Inscape Corp, and Jones Soda, all reporting.

4. A Chinese tycoon known as "Big Shot" reportedly got squeezed in the global nickel market and faced billions in losses. Here's how the short squeeze happened after prices hit $100,000 a ton — and seven things to know about the company.

5. The SEC and DOJ are investigating billionaire Barry Diller, among others, for possible insider trading with Activision. "None of us had any knowledge from any person or any source or any anything about a potential acquisition of Activision by Microsoft," Diller said, per the WSJ. Here's what to know.

6. The White House outlined Biden's executive order on cryptocurrencies. There are six key priorities for developing national policy for digital currencies, and Biden wants the Federal Reserve to keep exploring a Central Bank Digital Currency. Here's a list of the president's priorities for crypto.

7. NFT sales have been on the decline. Sales in January topped $1 billion in a single week. However, over the past week, sales dropped to $168 million — these were the five top-selling collections.

8. A full-time metaverse architect explained how he operates his business. He said a baseline $5,000 build takes him two or three days to create. Then, he broke down his prediction that the metaverse will have homeowners associations.

9. Billionaire investor Jeff Gundlach warned oil will top $200 a barrel this year. The DoubleLine Capital CEO, nicknamed the "Bond King," shared how investors should position their portfolios as the risk of recession has gone up "substantially."

10. Job openings hovered near record highs in January. According to data from the latest JOLTS report, the US had 11.3 million job openings in the first month of the year. That's down slightly from 11.4 million the month prior.

Curated by Phil Rosen in New York. (Feedback or tips? Email prosen@insider.com or tweet @philrosenn.)