Quote · The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway
The Week: How Leverage Broke the AI Trade
Where this was said
The Collapse of Situational Awareness: AI Jesus Falls to Earth
At 4:59 · chapter starts 4:05
This is the week's most dramatic story, and George Hahn tells it with precision. Leopold Aschenbrenner is 24 years old. His fund, Situational Awareness, was up 439% for the first half of 2026 and had swelled to roughly $45 billion [1] — George Hahn "Situational Awareness, the AI hedge fund run by 24-year-old Leopold Aschenbrenner, was up 439% for the first half of 2026 and had swelled t…" 03:59 . He told investors the sell-off represented an unusually attractive opportunity. Six days later, after mounting losses and margin calls, the fund sold most of its public stock portfolio to Ken Griffin's Citadel in a fire sale — leaving it with around $10 billion. Ed provides the colour: online, Aschenbrenner was 'AI Jesus' — hailed as the savant of his generation, a man who could predict the AI future. But he was secretly 5x leveraged into the hottest momentum trades in the world. When the position moved against him, there was no margin for error. The fund's Anthropic stake was also reportedly being sold. The moral is blunt: it looked like genius until it was revealed as leverage.
After margin calls and a fire sale of its public stock portfolio to Citadel, Situational Awareness was left managing roughly $10 billion.
Situational Awareness fund manager Leopold Aschenbrenner was revealed to be 5x leveraged, which triggered margin calls and forced liquidation of his entire public equity portfolio.
South Korea's stock market fell 44% from its June highs, wiping out $2 trillion in value, driven by retail investors in single-stock leveraged ETFs.
South Korea's stock market fell 44% from its June highs, erasing $2 trillion in value. The culprit: single-stock leveraged ETFs tracking Samsung and SK Hynix at 2–5x multiples launched in May. Ninety-two percent of investors were retail. Goldman estimated 3.4% of the entire adult population received a margin call.
