RAIT Financial Trust (Resource Asset Investment Trust) is a real estate investment trust owned by Fortress Investment Group that manages commercial real estate loans and properties. It is headquartered at 130 West 42nd Street,

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

History

RAIT was founded in August 1997 by Resource America, Inc. at which time it was led by Betsy Z. Cohen. In January 1998, the company became a

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange (l ...

via an

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

. In December 2006, the company merged with Taberna Financial Realty Trust. In August 2007, during the

subprime mortgage crisis The United States subprime mortgage crisis was a multinational financial crisis that occurred between 2007 and 2010 that contributed to the Financial crisis of 2007–2008, 2007–2008 global financial crisis. It was triggered by a large decline ...

, the company suffered due to its exposure to American Home Mortgage. In July 2009, the company sold its residential mortgage portfolio to

Angelo Gordon Angelo Gordon is a global alternative investment manager founded in November 1988 by John M. Angelo and Michael L. Gordon who together ran the arbitrage department of L.F. Rothschild in the 1980s. The firm is 100% employee-owned, SEC-registered, ...

for $15.8 million and took a $62 million loss on the sale. In March 2014, Urban Retail Properties became a subsidiary of the company. In November 2015, the company signed a lease to move its offices from the Cira Centre. In May 2017, the company sold

UBS Plaza UBS Plaza is a 25-story high-rise office building in downtown St. Paul, Minnesota. The building was completed in 1980 as part of the Town Square mixed-use complex. It is occupied by UBS Financial Services, architecture/engineering firm TKDA, and s ...

for $14 million. In December 2018, the company sold

PlazAmericas PlazAmericas, formerly known as Sharpstown Mall and earlier Sharpstown Center, is a shopping mall located in the Sharpstown development in Greater Sharpstown, Houston, Texas. The mall is located on the northwest corner of Interstate 69/ U.S. Rout ...

. In August 2019, after defaulting on its bonds, RAIT filed

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor ...

and agreed to be acquired by Fortress Investment Group for $174.4 million.

Magnetar Capital Magnetar Capital is a hedge fund based in Evanston, Illinois. The firm was founded in 2005 and invests in fixed income, energy, quantitative and event-driven strategies. The firm was actively involved in the collateralized debt obligation (CDO) m ...

, a

hedge fund A hedge fund is a pooled investment fund that trades in relatively liquid assets and is able to make extensive use of more complex trading, portfolio-construction, and risk management techniques in an attempt to improve performance, such as sho ...

, made a competing offer to acquire the company but the offer was rejected by a judge in December 2019.

References

{{Authority control 1997 establishments in Pennsylvania 1998 initial public offerings Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2019 Real estate investment trusts of the United States