TCW agreed to purchase Los Angeles-based Metropolitan West Asset Management on the same day it fired Gundlach, as it sought to replace the manager and his team and add mutual-fund assets. MetWest was acquired for about $300 million, according to court documents.

David Lippman, who was MetWest's CEO before becoming head of fixed income at TCW, is president and chief executive officer of the company following the deal, and Marc Stern, who was CEO, will be TCW's chairman when the transaction closes, according to yesterday's statement.

TCW's flagship fund is the $21 billion Metropolitan West Total Return Bond Fund, which has returned 8.4 percent in the past 12 months, putting it ahead of 96 percent of peers. It's run by Tad Rivelle, chief investment officer for fixed income, Stephen Kane and Laird Landmann, who are both generalist portfolio managers in the U.S. fixed-income group.

Employees' Stake

TCW was started by Day, the grandson of Superior Oil Co. founder William Keck, as Trust Company of the West. TCW's clients include corporate and public pension plans, financial institutions, endowments, foundations and high-net-worth investors. The firm also sells mutual funds to individual investors.

Before yesterday's deal, TCW employees owned a 17 percent stake in the firm, with Societe Generale and Amundi, an affiliate of the French bank, holding the rest, according to a person familiar with the breakdown who asked not to be identified because the matter is private.

Asset managers have been targets of private equity before because they provide relatively steady revenue, which helps service the debt used to finance leveraged buyouts. In 2007, Madison Dearborn Partners LLC acquired Nuveen Investments Inc. for about $5.6 billion.

Carlyle's Funds

Carlyle, the world's second-largest private-equity firm, will make the purchase through two of its funds and with money from TCW's management, according to a joint statement yesterday by the two U.S. firms.

"The bigger challenge is coming back to the market within three to seven years because when private equity makes an investment, within that time they're either going to have an IPO or sell it to someone else," Bobroff said, referring to an initial public offering of stock.