AI Safety Tactical Opportunities Fund (AISTOF)

The AI Safety Tactical Opportunities Fund (AISTOF) is a pooled multi-donor charitable fund organized and managed by JueYan Zhang, a philanthropic advisor with roughly a decade of prior experience as a hedge fund manager pursuing an earn-to-give strategy. The fund was established in September 2023 and is fiscally sponsored through Manifund (Manifold for Charity), a 501(c)(3) based in San Francisco. AISTOF focuses on mitigating catastrophic risks associated with the development of advanced AI systems. The fund is deliberately structured to be fast and to capture emerging opportunities in a rapidly changing landscape, covering technical alignment research, AI governance, and evaluations and auditing work. There is no formal application process; Zhang identifies and reaches out to promising grantees, or potential grantees approach the fund directly. As of available information, AISTOF has raised more than $30 million and has committed more than 150 grants. Notable grantees include Luthien (a $150,000 seed grant to help launch their AI control research nonprofit) and the Cooperative AI Research Fellowship ($30,000). Open Philanthropy has publicly acknowledged that AISTOF was doing independent funding in technical AI safety work before Open Philanthropy scaled up its own efforts in this area; AISTOF is often compared to Longview Philanthropy as a peer independent funder advising donors outside of Open Philanthropy's orbit. JueYan Zhang holds several concurrent roles: Board Treasurer at Rethink Priorities, Chair of the Investment Committee at Founders Pledge, Advisor to the SAFE-AI Program at Schmidt Sciences, and board member and seed funder at global health organizations Family Empowerment Media and Suvita. He also grants speculatively through the Survival and Flourishing Fund. The fund primarily serves medium-to-high net worth individual donors giving in the $100,000 to $10 million per year range.