Arizona-based Blueacorn questioned in congressional PPP loan fraud investigation

SCOTTSDALE, AZ — A Valley company, which helped gig workers and mom-and-pops get the federal loans to stay in business during the pandemic, is now at the center of a Congressional probe into whether the loans were made to fraudulent or ineligible applicants.

Blueacorn was founded in Scottsdale and helped process more than $12 billion in Paycheck Protection Program loans, according to the company.

Now the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis is asking company executives about how much they made and what they did to try to prevent the possible waste, fraud, and abuse of tax dollars.

Blueacorn’s advertisements flooded social media earlier this year.

“Most self-employed and 1099 contractors had no idea they could actually qualify for a 100 percent forgivable PPP loan,” one ad said.

The Fin Tech company posted a YouTube video showing how people can complete an online questionnaire and how their app wizard would autofill the PPP loan application. PPP loans were designed to assist small businesses to remain open during the pandemic.

Blueacorn sent the paperwork through one of two partners, Prestamos CDFI or Capital Plus Financial, which are lenders approved to work with the federal Small Business Administration.

Blueacorn helped to process loans for approximately 820,000 small business owners, resulting in $12.65 billion in PPP loans, according to a company spokesperson this week.

By one estimate,…

Read more…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *