Lehman Brothers (LEH), which is currently fighting for its survival, has on Friday (09/12/08) evening, reportedly received an offer for its asset management division from private equity firms Clayton Dubilier & Rice and Bain Capital. Lehman’s (LEH) asset management division encompasses Neuberger Berman and Lehman Brothers Asset Management.

According to the Lehman Brothers website, Neuberger Berman provides money management for individuals and families, while Lehman Brothers Asset Management specializes in investment strategies for institutional and qualified individual investors.

In a bid to raise capital and keep the firm going, Lehman Brothers was looking to sell the asset management division, while retaining the company, or seek outside investors who’d take a stake in the company and infuse capital into the company. Korea Development Bank was interested, but they could not agree on a price with Lehman and they faced opposition from the Korean financial regulators.

The stock, which had managed to stay above $12.40, an eight year low that was set on July 14th, started free falling on Monday September 8th and since Friday September 5th, the stock has lost 77%. The falling stock price this past week, pushed Lehman into overdrive and survival mode and the company started looking for buyers for the whole company. With the stock having falling to $3.65, which was the closing price on Friday September 12, 2008, Lehman’s (LEH) market capitalization is now just $2.53 billion, from the $11 billion market cap just a couple weeks ago.

The offer from the private equity firms, values the asset management division at $5 billion dollars, so if this is a solid offer that ends up going through, Lehman’s shares might get a boost as Wall Street realizes that the sum of the part is greater than the current whole.

Tags: Lehman  Neuberger Berman  Bain Capital  Clayton Dubilier & Rice