Citadel buys Situational Awareness after steep AI losses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_Aschenbrenner

https://web.archive.org/web/https://situational-awareness.ai...

> After publishing "Situational Awareness" in 2024, [Leopold] Aschenbrenner founded Situational Awareness LP, an investment firm backed by Patrick and John Collison, Daniel Gross, and Nat Friedman. Named after his essay "Situational Awareness", the AI-focused hedge fund manages over $20 billion as of 2026.

From this piece:

> Situational Awareness has exploded in assets over the last several months, with returns of 439 per cent from the start of the year to the end of June, according to an investor letter seen by the FT. Yet in recent weeks a painful rout in tech stocks has hit its portfolio, with the firm asking investors in recent days for additional capital.

> The hedge fund has operated with a skeleton staff, with only four investment professionals and a total of eight employees, according to its most recent regulatory filing.

> Aschenbrenner, who had no prior trading experience before starting the fund, worked for the FTX Future Fund, the philanthropic arm of Sam Bankman-Fried’s empire before it collapsed in late 2022. He later joined OpenAI’s “Superalignment” team before being fired over an alleged leak.

> The German-born investor became well known in Silicon Valley in 2024 after writing an essay titled “Situational Awareness” that detailed how he expected AI to dramatically reshape society in the coming years.

1. Situational Awareness was recently leading Fluidstack's $830 million Series A.

2. Fluidstack is helping lead Anthropic's $50 billion data center buildout.

3. Fluidstack is one of TeraWulf's major customers.

4. Some of Terawulf's bonds are tied to Fluidstack's leasing for the Anthropic operation.

5. Google is backstopping the bonds above, should Fluidstack not be able to pay TeraWulf.

I heard via a number of sources (e.g., CNBC) that some of Situational Awareness' private deals might not move forward as a result of what's going on.

It will be interesting to see if any data centers, leases, etc. become problematic as a result of this.

... so far, what's really odd is how positive markets are today despite a massive hedge fund focused on AI falling apart.