The bankruptcy estate of Lehman Brothers Holdings is close to naming a new board of directors to help finish winding down the collapsed financial firm, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.

The new board, made up of seven experts in restructuring, real estate and derivatives who are not tied to Lehman, will oversee the liquidation of tens of billions of dollars in assets for the benefit of Lehman creditors, the people told the WSJ.

A Lehman spokeswoman declined to comment to the Journal. Lehman could not be immediately reached for comment by Reuters outside regular U.S. business hours.

Lehman reported $639 billion of assets when it filed for protection from creditors on September 15, 2008, in the largest U.S. bankruptcy. The filing was a major trigger of that year's global financial crisis. Lehman was once the fourth-largest U.S. investment bank.

(Reporting by Sakthi Prasad in Bangalore; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

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