{"id":1008101,"date":"2026-08-18T06:38:21","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:38:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1008101\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T06:38:21","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:38:21","slug":"ai-investors-45b-hedge-fund-implodes-after-risky-chip-stock-bets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1008101\/","title":{"rendered":"AI investor\u2019s $45B hedge fund implodes after risky chip stock bets"},"content":{"rendered":"

The \u201cNostradamus of AI\u201d made a pair of $5 billion bets \u2014 only to watch his $45 billion hedge fund implode days before his lavish California wedding<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Leopold Aschenbrenner\u2019s Situational Awareness fund held a $5.7 billion stake in SanDisk and $5.6 billion in Micron Technology at the end of June, according to quarterly filings. <\/p>\n

The two bets made up more than half of his US stock portfolio, which had ballooned from less than $4 billion to more than $20 billion during the second quarter.<\/p>\n

Then the wheels came off.<\/p>\n

Leopold Aschenbrenner. Aschenbrenner recently founded an investment firm focused on AGI, with anchor investments from Patrick Collison, John Collison, Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross. For Our Posterity<\/p>\n

A former OpenAI researcher, Aschenbrenner had no professional investing experience, launching Situational Awareness in 2024 with a few hundred million dollars. YouTube\/Dwarkesh Patel<\/p>\n

SanDisk shares plunged 47% in July, while Micron tumbled 29%, helping wipe out roughly 67% of the fund\u2019s portfolio value in a single month. The losses triggered margin calls and forced Situational Awareness to sell billions of dollars of holdings in a fire sale to billionaire Ken Griffin\u2019s Citadel.<\/p>\n

Bloom Energy, the fund\u2019s next-largest holding, accounted for nearly 10% of the portfolio and also plunged 31% during the month.<\/p>\n

SanDisk shares plunged 47% in July, as Aschenbrenner\u2019s Situational Awareness fund held a $5.7 billion stake in the manufacturing company. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Meanwhile Micron tumbled 29%, helping wipe out roughly 67% of the fund\u2019s portfolio value in a single month. Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner had also sharply increased his positions in TSMC and opened a $1.2 billion position in Nebius before those stocks fell alongside the broader AI trade.<\/p>\n

The carnage shrank Situational Awareness from roughly $45 billion to about $10 billion \u2014 though the fund remained up sharply for the year after reportedly returning 439% during the first half of 2026.<\/p>\n

The disastrous bets also reportedly cost Wall Street trading giant Jane Street nearly $15 billion<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Aschenbrenner, 24, has become one of Silicon Valley\u2019s most closely watched AI thinkers. He graduated from Columbia University at 19 and later worked at Sam Bankman-Fried\u2019s now-defunct FTX<\/a> before joining OpenAI in 2023.<\/p>\n

He was fired the following year after allegedly leaking sensitive information to an Anthropic executive\u2019s husband.<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner quickly rebuilt his reputation with his 165-page essay, \u201cSituational Awareness: The Decade Ahead<\/a>,\u201d which predicted artificial general intelligence could arrive by 2027 and warned of the geopolitical threat posed by superintelligent AI.<\/p>\n

His hedge fund launched in 2024.<\/p>\n

The spectacular collapse came just days before Aschenbrenner\u2019s lavish California wedding.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the AI investing wunderkind made headlines once more for placing big bets again<\/a>, less than a week after his much-watched hedge fund Situational Awareness\u00a0saw a spectacular blow-up.<\/p>\n

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