Maybe if investors had a better idea of what was going on inside Fortress, the hedge-fund-and-investing firm's stock would not have followed a long, smooth downward slope since it came public in February 2007.

Despite the slithering stock price, the company has been able to raise new capital this year, and parts of its business have been performing well. But its earnings announcements are so opaque, that you could forgive investors for deciding discretion was the better part of valor and avoiding this fortress.

Last week, Fortress Investment Group (nyse: FIG - news - people ) posted a quarterly loss of $69.0 million, or 74 cents, after earning $61.1 during the similar period last year. Quarterly sales fell 53.8%, to $177.0 million, from $383.0 million during the similar year-ago period. Analysts had expected Fortress to earn 14 cents during the quarter.

The New York-based firm also said it raised $2.6 billion in capital during the quarter and that it raised an additional $1.8 billion since. Total assets under management grew 46.0% during the first three months of the year, to $34.2 billion. Lily Donahue, a representative for Fortress, told Forbes.com that institutional investors and high-net worth individuals had provided the new investment.

Donahue also said that the earnings results didn't accurately depict the company's health. "It's management fees and performance fees that drive the business," she said.

The hedge fund returns were down only 1.9% versus a 3.3% decline for the average distressed hedge fund performance in the quarter. Fortress specializes in buying under-valued assets. When conditions improve, so should its holdings.

Management fees, a percentage of total assets managed, were $145.0 million, an increase of 48.0%. Incentive income, or perfmormance fees, were $32.0 million.

Fortress's liquid funds which invlove a global macro-strategy including commodities, fixed-income, equities and currencies, had a positive return of 0.4%. This segment soundly outperformed the Standard & Poor's 500 index, which was down 9.9%.

Investors did not care for the results and sent the company's shares down 7.3% after they were announced on Thursday. The stock gained all of a penny on Friday, to $13.66. That's a pretty sad result for a company that came public at $18.50 and finished its first day of trading on Feb. 6, 2006, at $35.

Fortress is one of the few publicly traded hedge and private-equity firms. In going public, the "Fortress Five" which included Wesley Edens, 46, Robert Kauffman, 44, and Randal Nardone, 52, and Goldman Sachs alums, Peter Briger, 44, and Michael Novogratz, 43, were made billionaires in a single day. (See "A Quick Buck")