Leopold Aschenbrenner's $20 Billion AI Hedge Fund Imploded. Here's How It's Still Up 80% This Year

Leopold Aschenbrenner's AI-focused Situational Awareness hedge fund sold its public equity portfolio to Citadel Advisors to meet margin obligations after a market correction, according to reports. The fund had financed its public holdings with borrowed money amounting to as much as four times its equity, the reports said. When AI stocks declined, margin requirements forced the liquidation of those positions, leaving limited partners with no remaining public stock exposure. Despite the forced sale, the fund is still showing an 80% year-to-date gain. The gain stems from a private investment in Anthropic, which represented about 25% of net asset value and appreciated 620% year-to-date following new financing rounds. The public portfolio, including positions in CoreWeave, Sandisk and IREN, effectively lost its full value and contributed a negative 75% to overall returns. Anthropic's gain contributed roughly 155%, producing the net 80% result. The outcome illustrates how fund-level performance can mask vastly different results across individual holdings. Aschenbrenner has previously noted that avoiding a blowup is the primary task for investors.