Mr. Devaney’s Horizon Strategy fund, founded near the height of the mortgage bubble, is just the latest hedge fund to fall victim to the credit squeeze. Several others, including Peloton Partners and Sailfish Capital Partners, have stumbled as well.

But in the secretive world of hedge funds, Mr. Devaney stood out for his unusual willingness to go public with his views.

Many of the hedge funds that have run into trouble lately bought the same sort of mortgage investments that have cost Wall Street banks so dearly. But because hedge funds are private firms, their losses are not generally visible to the public.

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In an interview Wednesday, Mr. Devaney called himself a fighter and described his efforts to avoid the collapse of his fund during the last year. He said he had personally lost more than $150 million. And he described his plans to rebuild his business and reputation.

“I’ve taken as much pain as virtually anybody in this industry,” Mr. Devaney said. “I am bleeding, personally.”

He said he was determined to recover money for his investors last July, when he froze his funds, blocking investors from removing their money. But in September, a bank demanded he repay a large loan. That bank, which he would not name, seized 40 percent of the equity in his hedge funds. His accountants and lawyers told him to shut down his funds. But he did not, he said, because he wanted to try to save his investors’ money.

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“Other guys who are only looking at dollars and cents would have shut the fund down,” he said. “I have battled it out to try to save all my investors.”

In September, Mr. Devaney said he stopped receiving management fees on the funds, paying expenses out of his own pocket. He was also staggering beneath a $50 million trading loss in his main broker-dealer business, United Capital Markets Holding, which is still in business.

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The only money Mr. Devaney made last year came from his personal liquidations — some at a profit, like his Renoir, which he bought for $9 million and sold for $13.5 million.

Mr. Devaney thinks the mortgage crisis is nowhere near its end and expects regional banks and insurance companies to face big losses on mortgage bonds.

On June 26, as his hedge fund slipped away, Mr. Devaney sat down and wrote a letter to customers of his brokerage business, warning of the pain to come. For all his troubles, Mr. Devaney was unbowed Wednesday.

“Do I pack up everything and quit?” he said. “Do I retire? No!”