The $45 billion AI hedge fund Situational Awareness has imploded
Leopold Aschenbrenner's AI-focused hedge fund, which grew to roughly $45 billion at its peak, was forced to sell most of its public stock portfolio to Ken Griffin's Citadel after steep losses on AI infrastructure bets like SK Hynix and shorts that moved against it. Assets have fallen to about $10 billion. The former OpenAI researcher's firm will continue as a private investment vehicle, keeping a roughly $5 billion stake in Anthropic.
Why it mattersIt is the first major blowup of the AI investment boom. Markets are repricing how fast AI infrastructure spending pays off — and with leverage, even true believers can get carried out.
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