8/3/2026
By Charles Payne, CEO & Principal Analyst

Leopold Aschenbrenner & Situational (un)Awareness

Leopold Aschenbrenner graduated from Columbia at 19 years old, got a job with Sam Bankman-Fried, and then at OpenAI, where he butted heads with the bosses and the board. After getting fired, he wrote a 163-page Situational Awareness piece that drew even more attention from the brilliant class, which staked his hedge fund.

The fund began 2026 at $2.0 billion and rose to $45 billion, aided by  $3 to $4 in leverage per $1 of organic investment.

The fund went off the rails, exacerbating the July AI sell-off.

In a 2024 interview, Leopold had described the central rule of his investment strategy as, more simply, “Not blowing up is task No. 1 and 2.”

Part of his letter to limited partners last week:

Griffin Picks Up The Pieces

Big Buyers Make Their Move

Griffin and Citadel weren't the only folks picking up the pieces last week. Hedge funds made their biggest weekly purchases of stocks ever.

Morgan Stanley Picks The Bottom

In the middle of last week, Morgan Stanley (MS) declared it was time to buy AI Infrastructure, just as these names were making huge reversals.

There are wild cards from the war to the Fed, but I think Morgan Stanley nailed it on timing.

To read the full report, contact your account rep or email Info@wstreet.com

Charles Payne
Wall Street Strategies