Ken Griffin's Citadel posts best month in years after scooping up Situational Awareness stocks
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- Citadel's flagship Wellington fund returned 5.9% in July — its best month since 2022 — while its tactical and equities funds posted record-best monthly gains of 11.1% and 14.2%, respectively, with both up 27% year-to-date.
- Citadel acquired the bulk of Situational Awareness's public-stock portfolio at a significant discount late in July after the hedge fund was forced to unwind positions to meet margin calls.
- Situational Awareness, founded by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, unraveled after a sharp AI-trade reversal — long AI infrastructure, short software — that backfired on both sides of its book.
- Stocks like Nebius and Micron held by Aschenbrenner's fund rebounded in late July, with traders calling the near-collapse and Citadel's rescue a "clearing event" that prompted short sellers to take profits.
- Citadel managed about $71 billion in assets as of July 1 and has historically deployed capital during market dislocations into distressed or forced-selling situations.
Why it matters: Citadel deployed roughly $71 billion in AUM into one of 2026's largest forced hedge-fund liquidations, purchasing Situational Awareness's portfolio at a discount after prime brokers raced to meet margin calls — a textbook dislocation trade that also functioned as a short-covering trigger in beaten-down AI names like Micron and Nebius.
