Lehman Paid Its Managers, Lawyers $30.5 Million in December

Lehman Paid Its Managers, Lawyers $30.5 Million in December

By Linda Sandler

Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., which has now paid its advisers more than $1.1 billion during its bankruptcy, paid its lawyers and managers $30.5 million in December, according to a court filing.

Restructuring firm Alvarez & Marsal LLC, which runs the defunct investment bank through its co-founder, Bryan Marsal, led recipients with $393.4 million in fees for “interim management” for 27 1/2 months of work, including $10.9 million in December, according to yesterday’s filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP of New York collected $254.6 million for acting as the investment bank’s lead bankruptcy law firm through December. Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP got $89.9 million for advising Lehman’s creditors’ committee.

Lehman and its affiliates reported cash and investments of $22.1 billion on Dec. 31, up from $21.4 billion on Nov. 30.

Once the world’s fourth-biggest investment bank, Lehman said this month that it will speed up asset sales to pay unsecured creditors an average of 18.6 cents on the dollar. Its payments to advisers haven’t faced major challenges such as those in the bankruptcy of automaker Chrysler LLC.

Lehman filed the biggest bankruptcy in U.S. history on Sept. 15, 2008, with assets of $639 billion. Creditors include Goldman Sachs Group Inc., UBS AG, the New York Giants and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, as well as individuals who hold Lehman bonds.

The case is In re Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., 08-13555, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

--Editors: Charles Carter, Andrew Dunn.

To contact the reporter on this story: Linda Sandler in New York at lsandler@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David E. Rovella at drovella@bloomberg.net.