Leopold Aschenbrenner’s fund sells public stock holdings after losses

Leopold Aschenbrenner’s hedge fund, Situational Awareness, has been forced to unwind many of its public stock positions after suffering steep losses tied to artificial intelligence investments, according to people familiar with the matter. The fund, which was founded after Aschenbrenner left OpenAI in 2024, reportedly faced margin pressure as some of its AI infrastructure holdings fell and short bets on software stocks moved against it. Citadel has reportedly agreed to buy the fund’s publicly traded assets, while several prime brokers have been working with the firm to raise cash and reduce positions in an orderly way. The fund had grown rapidly earlier this month and was closely watched because of its strong performance and Aschenbrenner’s highprofile views on the AI trade. But recent declines in holdings such as SK Hynix, Nebius Group, Sandisk, Micron and CoreWeave have put pressure on the portfolio. The size of the losses and any remaining sales were not immediately clear.