Barrett Associates is leaving the Legg Mason fold. On Friday Barrett revealed in a filing that its own management team is buying the mutual fund firm from Legg, creating the new Barrett Asset Management as an independent company.

Pricing and terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Legg Mason spokeswoman Mary Athridge e-mailed a statement to The MFWire:

As part of Legg Mason's continuing efforts to focus its efforts on core businesses that it can grow to scale and to best serve all of our clients, we agreed to sell Barrett's firm back to management. Barrett's clients are primarily high net worth families that have been with them for years and we believe they can be best served by Barrett as a standalone firm. The firm is a small part of Legg Mason's wealth management business and the transaction is not material to Legg Mason.

The deal, signed on December 6, is set to close by the end of Q2 2011. Barrett boasted about $1.1 billion as of September 30 and has two mutual funds, the Barrett Opportunity Fund and the Barrett Growth Fund. John Barrett currently serves as the 73-year-old firm's chairman and CEO while Peter Shriver is its president and treasurer. Barrett became a Legg Mason affiliate in 2001. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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