The chairman's $5.2 billion offer will keep stores open—for now. : The company’s chairman and hedge fund manager Edward Lampert won the U.S. department store chain in a bankruptcy auction with a bid of approximately $5.2 billion, according to Reuters and the Wall Street Journal. Lampert’s winning bid was a slight increase from his initial $5 billion offer, which was further sweetened by assuming more liabilities. His only challenger was Sears itself: the bid by Abacus Advisory Group LLC, made on behalf of most Sears creditors and landlords, intended to close all of Sears’ stores and sell the inventory.