Has Carlyle Group given up on buying Neuberger Berman? Bloomberg's Jason Kelly and Jonathan Keethner report that, according to two sources, the private equity giant has "decided not to bid" for the asset manager owned by bankrupt Lehman Brothers. That could make the offer from Bain Capital and Hellman & Friedman the only one left on the table.

Of course, this is not the first time reports have claimed that Carlyle is out of the bidding entirely. In August The New York Times and the British Telegraph both named Carlyle as one of several private equity bidders for Neuberger (see MFWire, August 19, 2008 and August 26, 2008), only to have the Financial Times take Carlyle out of that list before the end of the month (see MFWire, August 27, 2008). By October, though, Carlyle appeared to be back, as it filed a motion alongside ex-Neuberger CEO Jeffrey Lane claiming that Bain and Hellman's bid was too low (see MFWire, October 15, 2008). Meanwhile, the bidding deadline of Monday at noon as reportedly pushed back several times (see MFWire, December 2, 2008). 

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