Fortress tries to gain on Street’s pain

Fortress Investment Group LLC is considering raising another $1 billion to take advantage of Wall Street turbulence, the New York Post reported. The New York-based publicly traded hedge fund is aiming to raise the extra cash on top of the $2 billion “credit opportunities” fund, used to invest in distressed assets, it has been marketing to investors since January. Fortress’ fund will likely purchase debt, including securities such as mortgage-tainted collateralized debt obligations and leveraged loans that have been stuck on bank balance sheets and have plunged in value, according to the report. Last summer, Frankfurt, Germany-based Deutsche Bank AG, Citigroup Inc. of New York, Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. of New York and UBS AG of Zurich, Switzerland racked up hundreds of billions in debt. Even though the financial institutions have shed a cumulative $90 billion in bad assets from their books, billions in assets still need to be unwound. A call to Fortress for comment was not immediately returned.