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The maker of flavors like Here Comes Truffle will remain as a stand-alone brand within Barilla Group

The Italian pasta maker Barilla Group has agreed to acquire Goodles, the nutrient-dense macaroni-and-cheese brand known for its colorful boxes and cheekily named flavors. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

Santa Cruz, Calif.-based Goodles was valued at $88 million after a 2023 funding round, according to PitchBook. It turned its first profit in 2024.

Goodles introduced its take on mac and cheese online in 2021, marketing its products as “Noodles, Gooder” by virtue of their protein and fiber content. Since then, it has trotted out flavors such as Here Comes Truffle, added a variety of healthier-for-you pasta noodles and expanded distribution to retailers such as Target and Whole Foods.

The company garnered 7.8% of U.S. spending on shelf-stable macaroni and cheese in the 12 months through the end of June, up from 0.8% in the same period three years earlier, according to consumer data firm Numerator. Kraft Heinz’s Kraft Mac & Cheese meanwhile saw market share decline to 36.6% from 42.2%, while sibling brand Velveeta fell to 18.9% from 21.6%. The figures, derived from an app where consumers share their shopping data, cover all sales channels and retailers except direct-to-consumer sales.

But Goodles sees itself expanding the mac-and-cheese market, not just taking share from incumbents. Mac and cheese generates an estimated $2.1 billion to $2.3 billion in sales of shelf-stable products each year in the U.S., according to data firm Consumer Edge, which analyzed purchase data from point-of-sale systems.

Eighty percent of Goodles sales are from consumers who hadn’t eaten mac and cheese in the past, or who are buying more than they had before, not from people who switched from other brands, according to co-founder and Chief Executive Jen Zeszut.

Goodles’s rise mirrors broader shifts in the U.S. dry pasta market toward healthier, organic and gluten-free options. “This shift has encouraged brands to rethink traditional recipes and ingredient sourcing, investing in products that align with health trends, allergies and dietary restrictions,” said Arielle Rose, an analyst at IBISWorld, in a March report.

Despite its growth so far, Goodles’s relatively small size was constraining further expansion, according to Zeszut.

“Ninety-two percent of the U.S. population hasn’t even tried Goodles yet, so we’re just getting started,” Zeszut said, wearing a pasta-noodle choker during a Zoom call to discuss the deal. “It was really either us choosing to get big on our own and raising a bunch of money and hiring a bunch of people,” she said, or finding a larger partner with more resources.

Zeszut said she met Barilla’s leadership team at a Formula One race last year but didn’t talk business.

Behind the scenes, however, Barilla said it had been following Goodles’s momentum the past few years. Barilla reached out in June to express interest in an acquisition.

Guido Barilla, chairman of Barilla Group, in a statement said the company was impressed by the Goodles brand, the products’ quality and the company’s momentum.

Goodles will continue to operate from its headquarters, with Zeszut at the helm and all 73 employees retained.

“I know that consumers are going to probably be like, ‘Oh no, Goodles is going to get gutted” and worry that the ingredients will change, Zeszut said. “That’s totally natural. There’s many data points from many other companies to make them feel that way, and the only thing we can say is, ‘Just watch us.’”

Barilla said the deal will close following regulatory approval.

Fiscal worries, a new Federal Reserve chairman and even the flood of AI bonds are helping drive the recent climb in yields

Worries about runaway government spending. A new Federal Reserve chairman. The huge surge in bond issuance to fund the artificial-intelligence build-out. There are many forces pushing Treasury yields higher. But the main driver of the recent run-up: inflation.

While a confluence of factors have powered the global bond slide that carried yields to multiyear highs around the world, a look inside market shifts suggests the key factor in this country remains the sharp climb in energy prices driven by the war in Iran.

“The sharp rise in global bond yields reflects investors reassessing inflation,” said Mike Goosay, chief investment officer and global head of fixed income at Principal Asset Management.

Here is a look at the key factors:

Diesel prices have surged this summer since the U.S.-Iran ceasefire fizzled and Ukraine began a campaign to knock out refineries in Russia, which is a major exporter of the fuel. Rising diesel prices tend to be more inflationary than those for gasoline since it is burned by trucks, trains, construction equipment and farming implements, lifting the cost of producing and shipping all manner of goods.

U.S. national average retail prices for diesel exceeded $5.68 a gallon on Wednesday, about $2 higher than a year ago, according to Dow Jones Energy. The price is less than a penny shy of the high hit this spring after fighting began in the Persian Gulf and hindered transit through the Strait of Hormuz and within 13 cents of the record set in 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine.

Futures trading points to higher prices at the pump down the road. Diesel futures for October delivery have risen roughly 13% over the past week.

It isn’t just inflation driving yields higher. Some investors also cited concerns over out-of-control government spending.

Gross U.S. debt surpassed $40 trillion for the first time last month, a milestone that only amplified the chorus of economists warning that America is on an unsustainable fiscal trajectory. Publicly-held U.S. debt as a share of gross domestic product is fast approaching levels not seen since World War II.

Overseas, soaring government bond yields in the U.K. have forced the government to try to cut its debts. And Japan’s 10-year government bond yield just hit the highest level in about 30 years amid a debate over tax cuts that could weaken Japan’s fiscal position.

Term premium

One place investors’ worries about fiscal policy or the growing supply of bonds would be evident is the term premium, typically defined as the component of Treasury yields that reflects everything other than investors’ expectations for short-term interest rates set by the Federal Reserve.

That has climbed recently. But the biggest change has come since the start of the Iran war, and some investors and economists note that term premiums are higher in Europe and Japan, signaling more worry about the fiscal situation overseas.

Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh’s Jackson Hole speech in late August alleviated some worries the Fed was insufficiently committed to fighting inflation, helping spark the climb in yields.

Still, Warsh has eschewed offering forward guidance like his predecessors, and the increased uncertainty is likely getting baked into longer-term borrowing costs in the U.S. and around the world, said David Kelly, chief global strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management.

“If you have to identify one thing that’s distinctly different from a few months ago, I do think it’s the behavior of the Federal Reserve since Kevin Warsh took over,” Kelly said. “I think there has been a Fed risk premium, even if it’s a small one, added to markets.”

Meanwhile, the effects of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s plan to buy back more longer-term bonds have been short-lived. “If the government says it’s going to raise taxes and cut spending to bring the deficit down, that’s one thing,” Kelly added. “Saying you found another credit card that you haven’t maxed out in your stack of 20 doesn’t actually inspire confidence.”

Allowing Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium to such levels risks bolstering congressional opposition to the deal

New details of the Trump administration’s agreement to provide Saudi Arabia with a civilian nuclear program are spurring criticism that the landmark deal doesn’t do enough to head off the risk of nuclear proliferation.

The text of the accord was shared with lawmakers last week along with a raft of related documents. It outlines a road map for how uranium might be enriched in the kingdom’s territory after further consultations, including at a level of nearly 20%.

Such an enrichment level could be needed to power a small modular civilian reactor, but it would add to the risk nuclear material could be diverted for military purposes unless there were stringent controls.

“There is a civilian case for it,” said Scott Roecker, a former Energy Department official who is vice president of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a nonprofit security organization.

“But the flip side is that at that level of enrichment you are most of your way toward producing weapons grade material in terms of the work that needs to be done,” Roecker added. “So you would want to be sure you know exactly where that material is and be sure you control it.”

President Trump has said on social media that the accord wouldn’t allow enrichment in Saudi Arabia, but signed a memo to top aides in July that endorsed the accord and its potential pathway to enrichment.

The U.S. spent years trying to prevent Iran from producing 20% enriched material. Under the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement reached by the U.S., five other world powers and Tehran, Iran’s enrichment of uranium was to be capped at 3.67% for 15 years at which point that restriction would lapse.

Trump withdrew from that agreement during his first term as president, setting in motion a dynamic in which Iran enriched uranium to as much as 60% during years of stop-and-start negotiations that were finally superseded by U.S. and Israeli military strikes. A 90% enrichment level is considered to be bomb grade.

U.S. companies and their foreign supplies would have a favored place under the agreement with Saudi Arabia and would run a potential enrichment facility, squeezing out the Russians and the Chinese, U.S. officials say.

“The deal provides some important benefits for the United States, including the revitalization of the U.S. nuclear industry and the strengthening of U.S.-Saudi strategic ties,” said Robert Einhorn, a former senior State Department official who worked on nonproliferation issues.

“The question for Congress is whether those benefits, as well as the restrictions built into the agreements, are sufficient to offset the inherent proliferation risks of sensitive nuclear cooperation with a country that has expressed an interest in nuclear weapons,” Einhorn said.

Trump has been sensitive to criticism from Israel supporters and arms control proponents that the U.S. should not sell nuclear technology to a country whose de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, said in 2018 that the kingdom would develop a nuclear weapon if Iran ever got one.

Soon after U.S. and Saudi officials signed the nuclear deal, Trump wrote in a July 23 social-media post that there “will be no enrichment of material!” under the agreement.

But while the accord doesn’t provide a green light at the outset for the enrichment of uranium on Saudi soil, it outlines a series of steps that could allow work to begin on an enrichment facility within several years.

Nor does the deal include the political condition Trump later added that Saudi Arabia must normalize relations with Israel and embrace the Abraham Accords. The White House says that Trump is determined to stick to that stipulation, but there is nothing in the accord that would preclude the president from changing his mind.

According to the deal, U.S. and Saudi officials will carry out a “Joint Enrichment and Conversion Study” within two years to study “the economic viability” of enriching uranium and arrangements to guard against proliferation risks.

During that study period, reactors could be sold, but enrichment would be prohibited.

If U.S. and Saudi officials agree on the need for enrichment. American companies and their foreign suppliers would construct a facility that would enrich uranium to a level of 5%. Further study by the two sides could lead to uranium enrichment that would approach 20%

Lawmakers who have poured over the text say there is no opportunity for Congress to challenge a decision to enrich if it is endorsed by the study.

“There is supposed to be a consultation that could last two years. Well, they could agree in two days,” said Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat who is a sharp critic of the deal. “We know that Congress won’t be involved.”

Blocking the agreement will be an uphill battle for congressional critics. The Senate and House would need to adopt a joint resolution of disapproval by a two-thirds veto proof majority to stop it. Barring such a step, the accord would legally take effect after 90 legislative days.

Trump administration officials say that the central role of American companies will ensure that nuclear materials cannot be diverted for military purposes.

Negotiators have also worked out an inspection agreement that would cover a list of sites involved in sensitive U.S.-Saudi nuclear cooperation. Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said last week that the verification arrangements appeared to be adequate.

“What is important for me is that I will have the capacity to do what I need to do in the country to verify that there is no diversion of nuclear material or no undeclared activity,” he said in an appearance at the Stimson Center think tank.

But Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Arms Control Association, said the arrangement stopped well short of the IAEA’s “Additional Protocol,” which allows the agency to visit any facility considered suspicious even if there is no nuclear material present. Iran was obliged to implement the protocol under the 2015 deal.

“This agreement establishes a standard that is far lower than that required by more than 100 countries around the world,” said Kimball. “And in this case we are dealing with a country that has threatened to pursue nuclear weapons.”

For all of the detail, some key elements of the deal haven’t been publicly disclosed. The Trump administration has said that the Saudis would be prohibited from enriching uranium on their own or with a foreign partner for 10 years if the U.S. opts not to support enrichment.

But such a commitment isn’t outlined in the unclassified information provided to Congress. And administration officials haven’t said if it is addressed in side letters or other documents that are to be shared on a classified basis.

A group of former nonproliferation officials from Republican as well as Democrat administrations have urged that any classified side agreements be made public so that the deal can be more carefully scrutinized.

“If the agreement and supporting side letters were negotiated to promote a peaceful, safe, nuclear exchange, what is it that the Energy Department or the administration has to hide?” the former officials said in a written request to Energy Secretary Chris Wright.

The White House denied it is withholding vital information. “These classified documents were transmitted to Congress consistent with the Atomic Energy Act,” said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly. “This transmission was intended to inform legislators with active security clearances.”

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For sweltering Britons, rising energy prices could spark a shutter boom

Shares in window specialists have outperformed the broader market in the past month

For UK homeowners, the news that energy bills are to reach a three-year high is an uncomfortable reminder of the running costs of staying cool. More autumnal temperatures are providing some relief — and space to consider how best to mitigate next summer’s heat.

Sweaty European households are choosing air conditioning despite its costs and climate impact, YouGov pollsters said last week. Britons, however, face a different calculus: while 38C days are no longer impossible, anything above 30C is still a rarity over the course of the year. So while searches for air-conditioned homes have doubled this summer according to property portal Rightmove, more than half of those surveyed said they would instead consider adding shading such as window shutters or awnings.

There are various ways — shutters, for example — to stop the sun’s heat getting through that, for the UK, make more sense. As for the size of the market, a back-of-the-energy-bill calculation suggests about 15mn homes might be in need of adjustment. That assumes demand is focused on the southern half of England plus Wales, as the regions that sweltered most, and excluding the one-fifth of properties that are owned by landlords, who presumably will feel less urgency to act.

As for the cost of staying comfortable when the mercury rises, a 2022 report by building consultants Arup estimated £11,000 per home — call that £13,000 now given inflation — for a package of shutters, ceiling fans and roof insulation. Arup assumed work would be done steadily, but the five heatwaves of 2026 may have changed things somewhat. A 2025 government case study estimated £6,000 for external shutters; upgrading windows would add £20,000. 

One unexpected effect of high temperatures is the potential impact on high-end homes, some of which are limited in their ability to adapt. Grosvenor Group, owner of swaths of London’s swankiest streets, last week called for easier planning rules to install double glazing and air conditioning in heritage buildings. The suffering of Mayfair’s wealthy residents aside, housing developments also limit owners’ ability to alter house facades for several years.

Still, shares in the likes of window specialists Deceuninck and Eurocell have both outperformed the broader market in the past month. So have those of builders’ merchant Travis Perkins, which flagged weather-related demand in earnings in August. Those who invested wisely can perhaps reinvest their portfolio gains into refitting their homes, lest 2027 be just as infernal.

Jonathan Reynolds seeks to quell fears of levy on companies spun out from UK universities that move abroad

Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds is seeking to quash speculation that the government is planning an exit tax for companies that move abroad after spinning out of British universities. 

Industry had been awash with rumours that Andy Burnham’s Labour government would impose a new tax to discourage UK-based companies from leaving the country with intellectual property developed with taxpayer support.

There are growing expectations that new chancellor John Healey will raise business taxes in the October Budget to address the worsening public finances, given Labour’s promise not to change the main personal tax rates.

But Reynolds has privately reassured business leaders that the government will not be pursuing an exit levy, which is typically based on a company’s valuation if it floats abroad or is acquired by an overseas buyer. 

One figure in the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade categorically rejected the idea that ministers are looking at an exit tax. 

“The department has been clear that exit levies are unequivocally ruled out,” they told the FT. “Keeping companies in the UK is key and it must be done by providing them with the environment and incentives they need.”

Speculation about a potential exit tax has been linked to concern over the loss of some fast-growing British companies in recent years. 

A report by the Royal Academy of Engineering found that more than 2,000 spinouts had emerged from British universities since 2010, including a handful of “unicorns” with valuations of over $1bn. But an array of high-profile tech firms had ended up in foreign hands.

Semiconductor company Arm was bought by SoftBank of Japan in 2016 and floated in the US in 2023, although it has retained a headquarters in Cambridge. 

Dan Neidle, founder of the think-tank Tax Policy Associates, said ministers should have quelled fears about the idea of an exit tax months ago.

“I know entrepreneurs who left the UK during the pre-Budget exit tax rumour last year,” he said. “It was one of the most foolish unforced tax errors by a British government.”

Speculation about tax rises has been heightened by the recent global bond sell-off.

Following the Spring Statement earlier this year, Healey’s predecessor Rachel Reeves had a buffer of just under £24bn against the government’s main fiscal rule. But surging market borrowing costs since then and higher inflation have potentially halved that headroom.

Labour’s 2024 election manifesto ruled out increases to National Insurance contributions, VAT or the basic, higher or additional rates of income tax.

That has prompted concern in the City that the government could consider business taxes such as a higher levy on banks, a rise in capital gains tax or an exit tax on entrepreneurs.

Craig Harrison, a partner at the JMW law firm, recently warned of the “real possibility that wealth creators will leave in large numbers due to fear of an exit tax”. He said: “If it is a possibility, why wait for it to be introduced?”

In 2024, a report by academics at the London School of Economics and the Centre for the Analysis of Taxation urged ministers to introduce an exit tax. 

“The UK is unusual among international peers in not levying any tax on people who leave the country after making substantial capital gains whilst living here,” it said. 

The report said there were already anti-avoidance rules covering individuals who move abroad temporarily to dispose of assets and then return.

“But anyone emigrating permanently, or leaving for more than five years, can currently take all of their unrealised gains with them fully tax-free. This results in a major ‘leak’ in the capital gains tax base,” it noted.

Last year the Startup Coalition, which represents tech start-ups, organised an open letter from more than 150 entrepreneurs in the tech world asking Labour not to introduce an exit tax.

They urged the government to “focus instead on making the UK the most attractive place in the world to build and scale the next trillion-dollar companies”. 

Dom Hallas, executive director of the Startup Coalition, on Wednesday welcomed the reassurance from the Business Department that there would not be an exit tax. 

“Obviously we want our universities to be attracting the best people to build here and that means carrots not sticks. So we’re delighted that the government has rethought the plans,” he told the FT.