10 things you need to know before the opening bell

Reuters

Here is what you need to know.

1. A judge just massively cut a $2 billion jury payout to a couple who claimed Bayer's Roundup weedkiller caused their cancer. The German pharmaceuticals giant has successfully reduced three major trial verdicts within the past year.

2. Alphabet soars after crushing earnings and announcing a $25 billion buyback. Analysts were particularly worried the tech behemoth's ad business would continue to decline, but Google reported 19% ad revenue growth, blowing past the 15% estimate.

3. The US economy likely grew at its slowest pace in more than two years in the second quarter. An acceleration in consumer spending was probably offset by weak exports and business investment.

4. Investors spooked by the trade war are running out of places to hide. Goldman Sachs says they should pile into stocks that act like bonds. Goldman Sachs say investors should move into "bond proxies" a relatively new term for a similar class of ostensibly low-risk equities.

5. US Secretary of State Pompeo said he'd go to Iran if needed as Iran tensions continue to rise. The UK government recently said that the Royal Navy would be escorting ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

6. Experts say that Intel had no choice but to sell its smartphone modem business to Apple for $1 billion, but it was still a lousy deal. Intel's smartphone modem business struggled to make headway against more successful rivals like Qualcomm.

7. Saudi Arabia's crown prince reportedly wants to build a $500 billion desert city with artificial rain, a glow-in-the-dark beach, and robot dinosaurs. Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman wants to build the $500 billion project to diversify the Saudi economy and lessen its reliance on oil.

8. Global stocks were mixed today. US futures were rallying, with the S&P 500 (+0.3%) up as was the Nasdaq (+0.5%.) In Europe the German Dax (+0.4%) was up as was Euro Stoxx 50(+0.3%.) Asia was mixed with the Nikkei 225 (-0.5%) and Hang Seng down (-0.7%), but Shanghai Composite up (+0.2%.)

9. There are lots of big earnings out today. Twitter is out later on, as is McDonalds and Nestle have already released their earnings today.

10. There's more interesting data in the docket today. The highlight being GDP annualized which is forecast to be down.