{"id":9275,"date":"2026-08-01T02:18:35","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T23:18:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/2026\/08\/01\/former-ftx-member-leopold-aschenbrenners-20b-ai-fund-blows-up\/"},"modified":"2026-08-01T02:18:35","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T23:18:35","slug":"former-ftx-member-leopold-aschenbrenners-20b-ai-fund-blows-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/2026\/08\/01\/former-ftx-member-leopold-aschenbrenners-20b-ai-fund-blows-up\/","title":{"rendered":"Former FTX member Leopold Aschenbrenner\u2019s $20B AI fund blows up"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Leopold Aschenbrenner, the founder of hedge fund Situational Awareness, has seen his leveraged positions liquidated<\/a> following a swift downturn in AI stocks.<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner, a former member of Sam Bankman-Fried\u2019s FTX Future Fund team, launched his fund in 2024 and ran it up 1,000%<\/a> by May this year.<\/p>\n

However, CNBC reported<\/a> Thursday that Situational Awareness had suffered \u201cheavy losses,\u201d needed cash for margin calls, and was consulting with investment bankers for the possibility of an orderly wind-down. <\/p>\n

By midday, the Wall Street Journal<\/em> reported<\/a> that Ken Griffin\u2019s Citadel had bought \u201cthe bulk of its stock portfolio.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fund was allegedly up 439% net of fees from January 1, 2026 through June 30 per a July 24 investor letter the FT cited<\/a>. Then July happened.<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner had borrowed money to upsize his AI bets, including Sandisk, Nebius Group, and SharonAI Holdings that have each lost at least 30% during the month of July.<\/p>\n

Leverage that multiplies gains on the way up does the same to losses on the way down. Holding a 3x leveraged portfolio in just those three stocks this month would have wiped out to $0.<\/p>\n

Although Aschenbrenner gained notoriety for his outperforming AI bets prior to July, before he borrowed money for stock trading, he sat on the five-person team running the FTX Future Fund<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was an effective altruism<\/a> grant-making vehicle. Bankman-Fried funded it largely himself, partially using money that prosecutors proved<\/a> he misappropriated from FTX customers.<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner joined at the vehicle\u2019s launch in February 2022 but resigned<\/a> on November 10 that year, one day before FTX filed for bankruptcy<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Another effective altruist needs more money<\/h2>\n

Aschenbrenner\u2019s FTX Future Fund collapsed alongside FTX and Alameda Research after prosecutors exposed Bankman-Fried\u2019s fraud.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were a tiny team, and then from one day to the next, it was all gone and associated with a giant fraud,\u201d Aschenbrenner told<\/a> the Dwarkesh Podcast<\/em>.<\/p>\n

After ending work with FTX\u2019s effective altruism in 2022, Aschenbrenner went to work for OpenAI\u2019s Superalignment team.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, by April 2024, OpenAI had fired<\/a> him over a disputed data leak. He turned the ousting into a viral manifesto, Situational Awareness.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He launched<\/a> a fund of the same name with a few hundred million dollars.<\/p>\n

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FTX-linked Effective Ventures sells UK manor at $14.5M loss<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Read more: FTX-funded charity Effective Ventures to shut down in the UK<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The mark-to-market valuation of his hedge fund was certainly impressive prior to this month. Situational Awareness grew starter capital into an alleged $20 billion<\/a> worth of assets by June, based on fleeting highs in AI stocks last month.<\/p>\n

That valuation is nothing close to what investors in Situational Awareness will actually receive if they tried to withdraw today.<\/p>\n

Buying Anthropic just like SBF taught him<\/h2>\n

Like Bankman-Fried taught him<\/a>, Aschenbrenner bought a stake in AI company Anthropic, which grew to be worth roughly one fifth of Situational Awareness\u2019 assets.<\/p>\n

Concentrated allocations plus leverage can create outsized returns on the way up and equally outsized losses during downturns.<\/p>\n

Situational Awareness was an investor in major AI stocks, includingin SK Hynix\u2019s US listing. Those ADR shares closed<\/a> Wednesday about 15% below their US offering price<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Aschenbrenner\u2019s investor letter admitted the fund had \u201cnot been immune\u201d to the swings, particularly in Asia, per the Financial Times<\/em><\/a>. Yet he insisted the selloff had created attractive buying opportunities.<\/p>\n

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> be leopold aschenbrenner
> work in crypto
> join ftx
> it blows up
> work in ai
> start situational awareness
> it blows up<\/p>\n

that’s cinema<\/p>\n

\u2014 Zack Voell (@zackvoell) July 30, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Aschenbrenner previously claimed to have allocated almost all of his personal net worth invested<\/a> into his own fund. Now, after another crash, the ex-FTX philanthropist is asking for more money.<\/p>\n

Situational Awareness\u2019 latest SEC report of its US holdings disclosed names as of March 31, 2026. The filing<\/a> listed 42 positions worth $13.7 billion. The next 13F lands in mid-August, and it will specify the precise drawdown in July.<\/p>\n

Got a tip? Send us an email securely via\u00a0Protos Leaks<\/em><\/a>. For more informed news and investigations, follow us on\u00a0X<\/a>,\u00a0Bluesky<\/em><\/a>, and\u00a0Google News<\/em><\/a>, or subscribe to our\u00a0YouTube<\/em><\/a>\u00a0channel.<\/em><\/p>\n

The post Former FTX member Leopold Aschenbrenner\u2019s $20B AI fund blows up<\/a> appeared first on Protos<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leopold Aschenbrenner, the founder of hedge fund Situational Awareness, has seen his leveraged positions liquidated following a swift downturn in AI stocks. Aschenbrenner, a former member of Sam Bankman-Fried\u2019s FTX Future Fund team, launched his fund in 2024 and ran it up 1,000% by May this year. However, CNBC reported Thursday that Situational Awareness had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9276,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[147],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-invest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}