AI Hedge Fund Heavily Invested in SK Hynix Loses 67% in One Month as SEC Probes Leveraged Trades
Nashnova编辑部
Situational Awareness, a hedge fund run by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, lost roughly 67% in July after a concentrated bet on SK Hynix blew up in Korea's market crash; the SEC is now probing its leverage trades, as cross-border chip-stock speculation triggers a regulatory chain reaction across the U.S. and South Korea.
How did one fund lose two-thirds of its value in a single month?
Situational Awareness launched in 2024 and ran a high-conviction, high-leverage strategy betting on AI-linked stocks. It once drew attention for outsized returns.
When Korean equities crashed, its heavy position in SK Hynix's Korea-listed shares was fully exposed. The fund posted a roughly 67% loss in July and was forced to liquidate most public-market holdings to repay lenders.
Aschenbrenner told investors: "How close we came to permanent capital loss exceeded what we're comfortable with." This means → the fund came within reach of total wipeout; it found a lifeline, but the damage is deep.
What is the SEC investigating?
Reuters, citing people familiar with the matter, reports the SEC is examining two things: the timing of trades that triggered margin calls, and communications between the fund and its prime lenders about leverage.
The lenders involved include Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Citigroup, and Bank of America. All four declined to comment.
In plain terms = the SEC wants to know whether the banks were aware of the fund's leverage buildup — and whether they met their risk-control obligations.
How did U.S. retail investors end up exposed to Korean chip stocks?
In May, Interactive Brokers became the first major broker to let U.S. clients trade Korean stocks directly. Around the same time, Roundhill Investments launched "DRAM," an ETF focused on memory-chip makers — Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix together account for nearly half of the fund.
DRAM attracted new money at a pace that made it one of the most successful ETF launches in U.S. history, reaching investors mainly through social media rather than traditional advisor networks. Even BlackRock and Vanguard took notice.
This means → a pipeline from U.S. retail wallets straight into Korean chip stocks was opened; when Korea's market crashed, losses flowed back through the same pipe.
How badly were Korean retail investors hurt?
Korean retail traders — known as "ants" — account for 60% to 70% of daily KOSPI volume. After Korea launched its first single-stock leveraged ETFs in May, retail investors could double down on Samsung and SK Hynix.
KOSPI then fell roughly 40% in about six weeks, erasing approximately $2.5 trillion in market value. Some investors sent funeral wreaths to parliament with banners reading "The ants are being slaughtered — parliament, respond."
In plain terms = leveraged ETFs let retail traders place a double-sized bet right into a 40% drop. The outcome was predictable.
How are regulators responding?
Korean regulators suspended approvals of new single-stock leveraged products, tripled mandatory cash margins to roughly $21,000, and expanded compulsory online training for individual investors.
Jung Eui-jeong, head of the Korea Shareholders' Alliance representing about 14 million retail investors, has called for delisting single-stock leveraged ETFs and creating a relief plan for affected traders.
KOSPI has bounced roughly 20% from its low, but the SEC probe is the pivotal signal. This reflects a deeper question: not "how much has the market recovered," but whether cross-border leverage risk can be systematically contained.
市场有风险，内容仅供研究参考，不构成投资建议。