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Luke LaHaie

Executive

PPP · PPPLF
Type
Person
Role
Executive
Programs
PPP, PPPLF
Updated

The profile

ACAP SME's principal and chief investment officer during the PPP, when ACAP serviced the loans The Loan Source bought from banks: 115,824 loans worth $11.24 billion, funded at the Fed's cheapest window. He is now co-CEO of Newity, ACAP's renamed successor, which beat The Loan Source's main claims in a Delaware contract suit in September 2026.

Identity and role

Luke LaHaie was chief investment officer of ACAP SME, LLC during the PPP, in American Banker's description, and its principal, in the Delaware court's. ACAP was the servicing and loan-acquisition partner of The Loan Source, a Melville, New York nonbank that holds one of SBA's 14 Small Business Lending Company licenses. ACAP renamed itself Newity LLC in 2022 and moved to Chicago; LaHaie is co-CEO (Newity team profile).

Pandemic-relief role

The Loan Source originated almost nothing: 192 PPP loans for $22.4 million, all in 2020. Its business was buying. Banks that made PPP loans collected SBA's processing fee up front, then sold the guaranteed loans to The Loan Source and handed it the forgiveness paperwork. The Loan Source pledged the loans to the Federal Reserve's PPP Liquidity Facility at 0.35 percent and became the facility's largest borrower by cumulative gross advances, with $9.16 billion outstanding at the peak on July 13, 2021. ACAP did the servicing. Its forgiveness workflow ran on a platform licensed from Biz2Credit, announced September 16, 2020.

The buyer earned no SBA fee on purchased loans; the schedule pays the originating lender. Trustmark's filing on its June 2021 sale said "Loan Source will assume responsibility for the servicing and forgiveness process." Northeast Bank of Maine, the largest seller and The Loan Source's correspondent for Fed pledges, said it had facilitated $11.2 billion of PPP loan purchases through June 30, 2021.

In the 2021 round ACAP and The Loan Source ran at least 70 partner landing pages. A January 2021 page for Lighter Capital read: "PPP is now live. Begin your PPP loan application with ACAP & The Loan Source today." SBA's loan data list no 2021 PPP loan with The Loan Source as originating lender.

How the book ended

SBA's data as of September 30, 2024 show 115,824 PPP loans, $11.24 billion, with The Loan Source as servicer. Forgiveness is recorded on 106,191, for $10.76 billion.

The Delaware suit

According to The Loan Source's complaint, as the District of Delaware summarized it in September 2023, the company began negotiating in May 2020 to sell its SBLC license to ACAP and LaHaie. ACAP's application to SBA to buy the license was withdrawn on November 23, 2020, after the parties learned it was likely to be denied "due to a lawsuit brought by LaHaie's former employers and pending against ACAP." On September 22, 2022, The Loan Source and its parent trust sued ACAP and Newity (No. 1:22-cv-01255). It is a contract dispute; no party alleges PPP fraud.

After a bench trial in March 2026, the court dismissed Newity from the case. Its September 15, 2026 opinion held that ACAP validly terminated the stock purchase agreement on January 1, 2023 and owed no break-up fee or cash-flow adjustment. The Loan Source won on a $50,000 extension fee, a breach the court found was not material, and defeated ACAP's $1,396,899.28 counterclaim. Judgment was entered on September 25, 2026.

Their own relief

We found no PPP, EIDL or SVOG money to LaHaie personally, or to ACAP as a borrower.

Luke LaHaie has not been charged with a crime. We found no SBA, FTC, CFPB or Justice Department action against ACAP, Newity or The Loan Source. The Loan Source is not among the lenders in the House Select Subcommittee's December 2022 fintech report.

Since 2025

LaHaie and David Cody run Newity as co-CEOs; a January 7, 2025 release said American Banker had named them among its top visionaries in banking. Newity has offered SBA 7(a) loans since September 2022, with Northeast Bank as partner.

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Original source documents and archived copies

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