Research NoteFilings & reported trades

Leopold Aschenbrenner’s holdings: what changed after the sell-off?

Situational Awareness is the investment firm run by Leopold Aschenbrenner. Its August filing showed June holdings—before the reported July sale to Citadel. September’s options reports describe later trades, not a fresh SEC snapshot.

Research Note

The idea behind the investments

His original essay makes the case for chips and power as constraints on AI scaling. Read it as a forecast with assumptions, not a guarantee of demand or returns.

The business links are tangible: Micron supplies memory and storage, Bloom Energy supplies on-site power, and CoreWeave provides AI computing capacity. Buteon’s view: these are plausible ways to invest in the buildout. The harder test is whether demand becomes cash after the cost of expansion—and how much of that success the share price already assumes.

Research Note

What the SEC filing actually shows

Form 13F is a quarterly holdings report that certain investment managers file with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Situational Awareness’s report lists $20.24 billion across 26 entries held on June 30, 2026. It became public on August 14. That total is the value of the securities listed—not the fund’s wealth after debts, and not its holdings today.

Original Buteon chart

The five largest disclosed holdings

Longer bars mean a larger reported holding. B means billion U.S. dollars. These are June 30 values, before the reported July sale.

June 30, 2026 · filed August 14

What the holdings were worth on that date—not their purchase cost

U.S. dollars · B = billion
June 30, 2026 · filed August 14. Values in U.S. dollars · B = billion.
MeasureValueClassificationNote
SanDisk$5.67BSEC filingNo additional note.
Micron$5.57BSEC filingNo additional note.
Bloom Energy$1.90BSEC filingNo additional note.
TSMC$1.27BSEC filingNo additional note.
Nebius$1.23BSEC filingNo additional note.
Sources: SEC information table (opens in a new tab); SEC cover & total (opens in a new tab); SEC filing date (opens in a new tab); SEC 13F limits (opens in a new tab).Reading key: patterns distinguish rows; the printed label—not the pattern—states the evidence class.Methodology: Share holdings ranked by filed market value, rounded to the nearest $10 million. TSMC is held through American depositary shares (ADS), which represent shares in a foreign company. Separate Bloom and TSMC call-option entries are excluded.

Buteon’s read on the June positions: SanDisk and Micron together were 55.6% of the disclosed total—more than half in just two names. That is the concentration to notice before counting the other holdings. This percentage comes from adding their two filed values and dividing by the $20.24 billion total; it is not their share of the fund’s net assets.

The report leaves out short positions (bets on falling prices), borrowing details and trades between snapshots. It cannot show the fund’s complete risk or explain why it owned each position.

Research Note

July: a reported 67% loss

Reuters reported that Situational Awareness, run by former OpenAI researcher Aschenbrenner, lost 67% in July and sold the bulk of its stock positions to Citadel. That is reporting on fund performance; a 13F does not report returns.

The Financial Times account, relayed by Investing.com, describes lenders stepping back. We could not inspect the full FT text, so this note does not reconstruct the borrowing or assert an exact amount of borrowing relative to the fund’s own capital.

Research Note

September: back to options, reportedly

On September 11, Investing.com relayed CNBC’s David Faber, citing unnamed sources: the fund had resumed buying options in Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Bloom Energy, CoreWeave, SK Hynix and SanDisk. These were reported trades in the preceding days—not newly filed holdings.

Quartz also relayed CNBC reporting of options in DRAM. DRAM is the Roundhill Memory ETF—an exchange-traded fund offering exposure to several global memory companies, rather than a single chipmaker.

An option is a contract giving its buyer a time-limited right to buy or sell a security at an agreed price. The upfront price is called the premium, and the buyer can lose all of it. The FT account relayed by Investing.com describes FLEX options, whose terms can be customized. Knowing the company name does not tell you the contract’s expiry date or how it fits into the fund’s other investments.

Research Note

One story. Five different dates.

In this 2026 timeline, the reported July sale falls between the snapshot date and the filing date. New filing, old portfolio.

  1. The portfolio pictured in the 13F.

  2. Reuters: 67% decline and sale to Citadel.

  3. June’s holdings become public—after the reported sale.

  4. Options activity reported by sources. A different kind of evidence.

  5. SEC deadline for September 30 holdings. Still a partial picture.

Research Note

Why Buteon studies events like this

  • Insiders: check the transaction type and the person’s prior behavior. An option exercise is different from buying shares with fresh cash.
  • Ownership: compare dated disclosures. Buteon’s Institutional Register is manually curated quarterly context, with limited company coverage—not live trades.
  • The business: watch company disclosures on orders, capacity, financing and margins. A famous shareholder does not replace that work.

This is Buteon’s “1 + 1”: connect who invested, what was disclosed and what happened next. We research important events to sharpen how we interpret evidence and to guide improvements to our features and coverage. Here, the lesson is concrete: a holding’s date, its disclosure date and later news must stay distinct. This is retrospective research; Buteon did not track the sale live.

Research Note

Sources & reading notes

  1. SEC · Situational Awareness 13F filing (opens in a new tab)

    Accession 0000935836-26-000418. Filed August 14; reporting date June 30, 2026. Cover and information table linked above.

  2. Aschenbrenner · The infrastructure essay (opens in a new tab)

    June 2024. Primary source for his forecast and its assumptions.

  3. Reuters · July losses and Citadel transaction (opens in a new tab)

    August 21, 2026; Reuters article carried by Investing.com. Fund performance is reported, not independently audited here.

  4. Investing.com · CNBC options report (opens in a new tab)

    September 11, 2026. Relay of David Faber’s source-based report; the page discloses AI assistance and editorial review.

  5. Quartz · DRAM options report (opens in a new tab)

    September 11, 2026. Relay of CNBC, not an independent confirmation of the trades.

  6. Investing.com · FT account of the return (opens in a new tab)

    September 11, 2026. Secondary account; full FT text was inaccessible. No exact leverage or option terms asserted.

  7. Roundhill · DRAM fund page (opens in a new tab)

    Primary source for the ETF’s identity and stated exposure.

  8. SEC · Form 13F questions and deadlines (opens in a new tab)

    Quarter-end snapshots, omitted shorts, reportable options and the November 16, 2026 deadline. Not a complete picture of a fund’s risk.

Research Note

The big investor moved. What changed next?

Following the whale is easy. Knowing what changed after the whale moved is harder. Buteon brings big-actor activity, institutional ownership research and insider disclosures into that picture, so you can weigh the evidence behind a move. Explore the research and add supported tickers to your Watchlist; coverage is selective and capacity depends on your plan. Bring situational awareness, not borrowed conviction.

Research Note

Research disclosure

Educational research reviewed through September 13, 2026. No investment advice or recommendation to copy positions. Filings, source-based reporting and Buteon interpretation are distinguished throughout; holdings and product coverage can change.