The Surprising Turnaround of a Young Employee Expelled from His Company... Transformed into a 'Genius Investor' with 1,000% Returns [Tech Talk]

Leopold Aschenbrenner, Born in 2001
From OpenAI Dismissal to Investor Transformation
A 'Prophetic' AI Investment Strategy... The Next-Generation Guru

Editor's NoteThis series explains essential yet often unfamiliar technologies such as AI, semiconductors, telecommunications, and biotechnology, breaking them down in an easy-to-understand way for readers.

Thanks to the AI boom, the share prices of numerous technology companies—including Samsung Electronics and SK hynix—have soared. Amid this surge, who has earned the highest returns during the current AI wave?

There is a rising star who has achieved a cumulative return of 1,000% over the past two years. His name is Leopold Aschenbrenner. Although he is in his twenties, born in 2001, he leads the hedge fund Situational Awareness (SA), which manages assets worth approximately 30 trillion won.

1,000% Return in Just Two Years... The New Investment Star of the AI Era

AI investor Leopold Aschenbrenner. Captured during a 2024 interview. YouTube screenshot

While hedge funds are known for their aggressive asset management, SA has particularly stood out during this AI boom. Since its establishment in September 2024, it has delivered returns exceeding 1,000% through the first quarter of this year, and its assets under management (AUM) are reported to have surpassed USD 20 billion (about 30 trillion won).

What stocks generated this 1,000% return? SA has primarily focused on companies related to AI data centers. Their investments have included not only semiconductor firms and data center construction companies, but also manufacturers of energy equipment, which are expected to become one of the biggest bottlenecks for AI in the future.

However, SA does not always buy AI companies. If the market appears overheated, it sometimes bets on a price decline. Indeed, in its disclosures for the first quarter, SA drew attention for purchasing put options on leading AI companies such as Nvidia. Thanks to these exceptional results, trading platforms and financial publications have dubbed SA names like “the prophet,” “rising star,” and “next-generation stock guru.”

Revealing Investment Strategies Through a Prophetic AI Vision Essay

Essay "Situation Awareness: The Next Decade" for 2024 published as Aschenbrenner started investing. Homepage screenshot

Aschenbrenner, the founder of SA, is a German born in 2001 who now resides in the United States and is fully devoted to investing. However, his first career was as an AI researcher. In 2023, he joined OpenAI’s Superalignment department, working with a team that included another renowned researcher, Ilya Sutskever.

But Aschenbrenner was expelled from the company in less than a year, accused of leaking corporate information to external parties. Within just a few months, he founded SA and reinvented himself as an investor rather than a researcher.

One of the key reasons Aschenbrenner is so highly regarded is the 165-page essay he published when founding SA. Entitled “Situational Awareness: A Decade Ahead,” the report offered detailed predictions about what would happen in the AI industry over the next ten years, what technologies would emerge, and how competition among companies would unfold.

In the essay, he wrote, “Many analysts expect the present (2024) to be the peak of AI technology. They are simply ignoring reality. They see AI as an overhyped fad, a means of maintaining existing business, or at best a technology on the scale of the internet,” expressing strong criticism. He continued, “Soon the world will awaken. There are hundreds of people in AI research labs with true ‘situational awareness’—people who have accurately predicted advances in AI in recent years.”

OpenAI's Super Large AI Data Center. OpenAI Website

Aschenbrenner went on to predict that AI-related revenues would surge rapidly, leading to the construction of data centers and power plants worth trillions of dollars, while advances in AI would deepen conflicts between major powers such as the United States and China, and cyber security concerns would rise due to fears of AI-driven hacking. So far, two years later, Aschenbrenner’s analysis has proven entirely accurate.

SK hynix, Energy, and More... Relentless Aggressive Investments

Having become a billionaire investor in just two years, Aschenbrenner shows no sign of slowing down. On July 6, he indicated his willingness, alongside other hedge funds and asset management firms, to purchase about USD 7 billion worth of SK hynix's American Depositary Receipts (ADR).

He has also invested in Bloom Energy, an American eco-friendly fuel cell company, and has increased holdings in cryptocurrency mining firms that have shifted to data center construction. It appears that Aschenbrenner remains convinced that the global boom in AI investment is only just beginning to accelerate.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.