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Leopold Aschenbrenner: Situational Awareness, the $24 billion hedge fund founded by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, has exited every public stock position it held.
The move follows steep losses tied to artificial intelligence investments and a failed short bet against software stocks.
People familiar with the matter say the losses left the firm scrambling to raise cash.
The fund unwound its entire public portfolio in a single transaction with another major hedge fund, according to sources.
Long and short equity positions together made up roughly two-thirds of the firm's total holdings.
What Triggered the Losses
Situational Awareness took a hard hit in recent weeks. Its bullish positions in AI infrastructure names, including SK Hynix, lost value.
At the same time, its short bets against software companies like Adobe moved sharply in the wrong direction.
Prime brokers including Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase stepped in to help the fund meet margin calls.
Sources say the brokers worked to help the firm reduce its exposure in an orderly manner.
Ahead of Thursday's market open, those brokers were already shopping a portion of the fund's long and short holdings to potential buyers.
A buyer has now reportedly been found for the fund's entire public equity book.
Situational Awareness will keep operating, but its holdings are now limited to private investments, according to people close to the matter.
Fund Also Seeking Buyers for Private Stakes
Beyond its public portfolio, Situational Awareness has been shopping stakes in privately held companies to raise liquidity.
That includes a position in Anthropic. The exact size of the stake being offered is unclear, but sources say prospective buyers have shown interest in acquiring part or all of it.
Situational Awareness did not respond to requests for comment.
Aschenbrenner's Rise in the AI Investment World
Aschenbrenner, 25, built his reputation as one of the most closely watched figures in AI-focused investing.
His fund was built on the thesis that increasingly powerful AI systems would demand a massive buildout of chips, memory, data centers and electricity generation.
At the end of the first quarter, the fund's top holdings included Nebius Group, Sandisk, Micron and CoreWeave, regulatory filings show. All four stocks have fallen more than 35 percent this month.
Aschenbrenner first drew attention in tech and finance circles in 2024, when he published a series of essays predicting that AI's rapid progress would require enormous growth in computing power, advanced semiconductors, memory and energy capacity.
Those essays became the intellectual backbone of Situational Awareness after he left OpenAI.
A Columbia University graduate, Aschenbrenner finished as valedictorian at age 19 before joining OpenAI's Superalignment team.
He was dismissed from OpenAI in 2024, with the company citing an improper disclosure of internal information.
Aschenbrenner has pushed back on that account, saying he shared a mostly nonconfidential planning document with outside researchers seeking feedback.
He has also linked his firing to tensions over concerns he raised about OpenAI's security practices, a claim OpenAI has said is unrelated to his departure.
Aschenbrenner is engaged to Avital Balwit, chief of staff to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, according to an October profile in Fortune that cited a Situational Awareness LP spokesperson.
The total scale of the fund's losses, along with how much capital it is seeking to raise, remains undisclosed.
Visual Disclaimer: This is an AI-generated illustrative portrait. It is used for creative representation and does not depict a real-time event. Created by AD News Live.
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