Business Notes DEALS

When an attempted buyout of UAL, the parent company of United Airlines, collapsed two months ago, the news sparked the minicrash of Oct. 13. Now the failed bid is the talk of Wall Street once again, this time because of a Wall Street Journal report that bankers and lawyers will earn $58.7 million in fees for the deal, despite its downfall. More than $8 million will go to the investment firm Lazard Freres, which advised United's pilots union in the labor-management bid to buy the carrier for $6.8 billion.

UAL may be obliged to pay the bills because it accepted the proposed bid, which fell apart when the banks could not raise enough money to finance the buyout. (Citicorp and Chase Manhattan will receive a total of $8 million for their work.) The fees have infuriated some UAL shareholders, since the payments will come out of the company's profits.