The Economist has published a correction to its earlier report that Henry Kravis, KKR’s archetypal “Barbarian at the Gate”, may have stumped up 22 million euros for a chair once owned by Yves Saint Laurent:

“Our report suggested that Henry and Marie-Josée Kravis may have been the purchasers of an early 20th-century chair designed by Eileen Gray. Mr Kravis assures us that neither he nor anyone in his family bought the chair in question. Our apologies to all concerned,” the free-trade-loving weekly says.

Our post yesterday on the Economist’s original story prompted some acerbic follow-ups elsewhere in the blogosphere and a firm denial from Kohlberg Kravis Roberts HQ.

Anyone who knows the whereabouts of the actual buyer of the chair, or who wishes to speculate as to his or her identity, please leave a comment.

(This updates an earlier post with KKR’s denial).

Maybe the days of private equity paying eye-watering prices at auction really are over.

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts has firmly denied a report in the Economist’s books and arts section saying that, despite the deep economic funk, buyout doyen Henry Kravis was behind the “startling” $28 million purchase of a vintage chair at the recent Yves Saint Laurent sale in Paris:

“Who, in the current climate, were the buyers?” the Economist asked. ”Few prices were more startling than the €22m commanded by an early 20th-century chair designed by Eileen Gray. Cheska Vallois, an Art Deco dealer, won the work in the room; it is thought that she did so on behalf of Henry and Marie-José Kravis, who had already acquired examples of Gray’s work from Ms. Vallois at the Biennale des Antiquaires in Paris.”

But this is one sales process KKR is keen to distance itself from.

“Contrary to speculation, I can categorically deny that neither Henry Kravis, nor anyone in his family, purchased the chair in question,” KKR spokesman Peter McKillop told Reuters in an email. A spokeswoman for the Economist did not immediately return an (admittedly late in the evening) request for comment.

Who was Gray anyway? As London’s Design Museum explains, Gray is “regarded as one of the most important furniture designers and architects of the early 20th century and the most influential woman in those fields.” Kravis, as you must know, was by Forbes’s reckoning the 49th richest American last year.

The sale of the Neuberger asset management arm of Lehman might have been agreed back in September, but it’s not quite a done deal.

The whole process has been rather messy — Lehman put a majority percentage of the prized asset management arm up for sale in August, prior to filing for bankruptcy.

The unit, one of Lehman’s best performing assets, drew interest from a number of private equity bidders such as Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, Hellman & Friedman, Blackstone, Bain Capital and Clayton Dubilier & Rice, sources previously said.

Some estimates valued the unit between $8 billion and $10 billion.

After its September bankruptcy filing, the whole of the asset was marketed. Bidders were whittled down to the winning team of Bain Capital LLC and Hellman & Friedman LLC who clinched the deal for $2.15 billion.

Typically, that would have been the end of it — but because the sale was being done after Lehman filed for bankruptcy, an auction is to take place and could draw counter bids. The 45-day clock for the auction started ticking in October and stops at noon on Monday.

The most likely potential bid could come from Carlyle Group, which together with former Neuberger Berman Chief Executive Jeffrey Lane, in October filed an objection to the sale of Neuberger and said in court it would itself be interested bidding, but believed that Bain and H&F had an unfair advantage.

A source familiar with the matter previously told Reuters that Carlyle was expected to bid.
Lane, according to the Wall Street Journal, is a Wall Street veteran who joined Neuberger in 1998, saw the firm through its 1999 IPO and $2.6 billion sale to Lehman Brothers in 2003. After serving as a vice chairman of Lehman, Bear Stearns hired Mr. Lane in 2007 to try and shore up its asset-management unit after two of its hedge funds collapsed, the WSJ said. After Bear itself imploded, Mr. Lane became chief executive of private bank Modern Bank, it said.

Carlyle and Lane claimed the price paid for Neuberger was too low and violated Lehman’s obligation to maximize the value of its asset sales to pay off creditors, in an objection filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.

It goes against so-called Hornbook Law, the most basic, elementary law of all.

“This is patently contrary to hornbook law that a debtor which sells assets in a chapter 11 case has an obligation to seek the highest and best values for the benefit of its estate,” the objection said.
Other bidders could also come out of the woodwork. Silverlake has been one name mentioned by sources as having shown interest in the past.

The sale of Neuberger next week could be interesting if there’s a fight for the asset, with an auction set for court on Wednesday.

These are the deadlines the bankruptcy court has set:

• The deadline to submit a Qualified Bid (as defined in the Bidding Procedures) is December 1, 2008 at 12:00 noon (New York time).
• An auction has been scheduled for December 3, 2008 at 10:00 a.m. (New York time).
• The deadline to lodge an objection with the Bankruptcy Court to the proposed sale is December 17, 2008 at 4:00 p.m. (New York time). Objections must be filed and served in accordance with the Bid Procedures Order.
• The Bankruptcy Court will conduct a hearing to consider the proposed sale on December 22, 2008 at 10:00 a.m. (New York time).

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts’s plan to IPO is nothing new - the company filed its paperwork to do so a year ago. So why should the storied firm of private equity titan Henry Kravis (pictured) choose now to tap this battered market? Problems at its Amsterdam-listed fund are also hardly new. Shares of the fund, set to be exchanged for new NYSE-listed KKR shares as part of the offering, jumped 27 percent during morning trade. They had fallen about 30 percent since the beginning of May, and had lost more than half their value since late February last year as the credit crisis bit. It’s hard to see the deal framed as a statement of confidence that IPO investors are going to step up to the bar, given all the grim news swirling capital markets. What else might be prompting this move? Carlyle Capital Corp, an affiliate of U.S.-based buyout firm Carlyle Group and mainly invested in mortgage-backed assets, went bankrupt in March and liquidated its assets as it could not meet margin calls from its lenders. KPE said in March it had no exposure to residential real estate loans, but its net asset value dropped 3.4 percent in the second quarter amid investment losses and foreign currency transactions after a 5.4 percent drop in net assets from operations in the first quarter.

Consumer goods giant Unilever agreed to sell its North American laundry business to private equity firm Vestar Capital Partners for about $1.45 billion to complete the bulk of its sell-off program. The business makes Snuggle, Wisk and Surf products and had been looking to sell it for almost a year in its struggle to compete as a distant No. 2 behind archrival Procter and Gamble. Vestar intends to fold the business into its Huish Detergents operations and re-name it Sun Products Corp.

Other deals of the day:

* Britain’s BAE Systems said it had made a recommended offer for Detica Group, a provider of IT services to the national security sector, at 440 pence a share, valuing the business at about 538 million pounds ($1.07 billion) including assumed debt.

* French electrical engineering group Schneider Electric has agreed to buy Canada’s Xantrex for 415 million Canadian dollars ($409.3 million) to boost its renewable energy equipment operations.

* U.S. computer services and software group International Business Machines has agreed to buy French software maker Ilog for 215 million euros ($340 million), the companies said.

* Greek buyout firm Marfin Investment Group bought a 50 percent stake in Croatian tourism group Sunce Koncen as part of its expansion plans, MIG said in a statement.

* China’s Sichuan New Hope Agribusiness said it has acquired a dairy producer in Inner Mongolia in a deal that a Chinese newspaper said was worth 100 million yuan ($14.7 million).

* LUKOIL, Russia’s second-largest oil producer, has acquired 100 percent of Turkish firm Akpet, which accounts for about 5 percent of Turkey’s oil retail market, the company said.