Situational Awareness Hedge Fund Sells Public Portfolio to Citadel Amid Losses
Situational Awareness, a hedge fund founded by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, has sold the majority of its public stock portfolio to Citadel following significant losses in recent weeks. The fund had previously seen strong returns and grew assets under management up to $45 billion before experiencing sharp declines due to falling AI infrastructure equities. Despite a downturn, Aschenbrenner remained optimistic about further investment opportunities but failed to attract new capital commitments. The hedge fund's portfolio included major positions in companies like SK Hynix, SanDisk, Bloom Energy, and Nebius Group—stocks that dropped over 30% recently as concerns grew around the sector’s ability to generate near-term revenue. The losses were exacerbated by leverage strategies commonly used in hedge funds. After Citadel acquired most of these holdings, Situational Awareness' assets fell from $20 billion to about $10 billion. Despite public market setbacks, Situational Awareness still holds a valuable stake in Anthropic, valued at around $5 billion according to Bloomberg. The AI company is expected to go public soon and may be worth even more.
Topics: AI infrastructure investments hedge fund stock portfolio liquidation