10 things you need to know before the opening bell

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Here's what you need to know before markets open.

1. European stocks tumble after the UK adds six more countries to its COVID-19 travel quarantine list. Data from Eurostat shows that Eurozone GDP shrank 12% for the second-quarter, its sharpest decline since records began in 1995.

2. Jim Simons' Renaissance fund dumped Apple and Amazon and boosted its Tesla stake last quarter. The Cold War codebreaker and MIT math professor's quantitative hedge fund also ramped up its Zoom investment by 160%.

3. China is far behind and is 'never gonna catch up' with the Phase 1 trade agreement with the US, an expert says. US and Chinese officials are scheduled to meet over video conferencing on Saturday.

4. Mohamed El-Erian warns gold's status as a 'must-have' asset has made it develop a 'bipolar personality.' Gold's rapid rise is "another unintended result in a lengthening list of the exceptional involvement of central banks in the functioning of markets."

5. Fred Liu's Hayden Capital has returned more than 100% in 2020. He breaks down the simple strategy he used to pinpoint 2 stocks that grew 10 times within just a few years. The founder and portfolio manager at Hayden Capital shared an inside look at his stock-selection process.

6. Bank of America shares a simple stock-trading strategy with a track record of repeatedly beating the market — including the 20 companies that best exploit it now. The bank says betting against hedge funds by buying what they don't like and selling what they're buying works surprisingly well.

7. Goldman Sachs explains the biggest factors that will drive returns in all 11 stock-market sectors amid virus uncertainty — and lays out how you should position your portfolio in each one. Here's how much of tech, financials, and other stock-market sectors Goldman recommends owning as pandemic and election uncertainty persist.

8. Global stocks are mostly down. In Europe, Germany's DAX fell 1.2%, Britain's FTSE 100 fell 1.8% and the Euro Stoxx 50 fell 1.5%. In Asia, China's Shanghai Composite rose 1.2%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.2%, and Japan's Nikkei rose 0.2% at the close. In the US, futures underlying the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500, and the US Tech 100 fell 0.4%.

9. Earnings expected today. Rosneft and Hapag-Lloyd are highlights.

10. On the economic front. Baker Hughes US oil rig count and non-farm productivity are due.