Bitcoin miner stocks have faced downward pressure from a large seller for three weeks, but Ken Griffin stated on Friday that the liquidation is nearly complete. Citadel has unwound more than 80% of the risk it absorbed from Leopold Aschenbrenner’s Situational Awareness portfolio.
Situational Awareness, an AI-focused fund managed by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, gained 439% in the first half of 2026 before suffering a 67% loss in July while leveraged four to one. On July 30, the fund handed roughly $10 billion of stock to Citadel.
The Portfolio Breakdown
According to the fund's 13F quarterly holdings report filed on August 14 for the period ending June 30, the $20.24 billion portfolio contained $1.99 billion in Bitcoin miners. The holdings included Core Scientific at $666 million, Riot Platforms at $468 million, IREN at $433 million, CleanSpark at $179 million, and a $152 million stake in Keel Infrastructure, formerly Bitfarms.
Aschenbrenner targeted miners for their grid capacity and power megawatts rather than Bitcoin itself. However, the fund removed its hedges by dropping $8.5 billion of put options against AI names and replacing them with $12.5 billion of outright long bets, primarily in memory chips such as SanDisk and Micron. When chip stocks declined in July, the miner positions suffered as collateral damage.
Citadel's Execution
Citadel executed nearly 100 block trades worth over $4 billion to distribute the risk, including the largest intraday blocks of the year in 10 separate names. Griffin noted in a letter to clients that Citadel acquired the portfolio at a discount, leading to sharp gains for three Citadel funds.
With the large seller largely out of the market, the sector returns to its fundamentals, aided by a 7% daily gain in Bitcoin that lifted the price to approximately $77,309 and its market capitalization to roughly $1.55 trillion.
