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Nathan "Nate" Reis

Executive

PPP
Type
Person
Role
Executive
Programs
PPP
Updated

The profile

Co-founder and first CEO of Blueacorn. Pleaded guilty on August 11, 2025 to conspiracy to commit wire fraud (N.D. Tex. 4:24-CR-287-O); sentenced December 18, 2025 to 120 months and $66,038,049.27 in restitution. Notice of appeal filed December 29, 2025.

Individuals whose conduct was challenged or called into question during or after the pandemic. See sources: Indictment, Nov. 14, 2024 DOJ sentencing release

In the archive

Identity and role

Nathan Reis, who goes by "Nate," co-founded Blueacorn in April 2020 and served as its first Chief Executive Officer. Blueacorn was an Arizona lender service provider (LSP). Reis founded the company with his wife, former Phoenix television anchor Stephanie Hockridge, and technology entrepreneur Noah Spirakus. By the time of his December 2025 sentencing he was 47 and living in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico.

Biography / career arc

Reis worked as an account executive at Lehman Brothers from roughly February 2004 to July 2006, selling subprime derivatives. The House Select Subcommittee's report describes him as a "cell phone accessory merchant and former Lehman Brothers subprime derivative salesman."

After Lehman he ran small ventures in Arizona. By 2017 he was founder and CEO of a company called Juuice, and he and Hockridge were associated with Juuice Inc., Juuice LLC and Body Politix, entities that appear in his factual resume as the borrowers on his first fraudulent loans.

Blueacorn was founded the month the program launched. By 2021 it was reviewing roughly 1.7 million applications and forwarding the 739,282 it told the Subcommittee it had approved and sent to lenders for funding, through two community-development lenders: Prestamos CDFI in Phoenix and Capital Plus Financial in Bedford, Texas. Hockridge described the early operation as "building the parachute after we jumped out of the plane."

The company and its PPP/EIDL role

Blueacorn collected, screened, and packaged PPP applications and submitted them to its partner CDFIs in exchange for a share of the lenders' SBA processing fees. It took in roughly $1.08 billion in fees: more than $700 million from Prestamos and over $385 million from Capital Plus. The company itself was never criminally charged and faced no civil fraud judgment; the SBA suspended Blueacorn and Womply from working with the agency in December 2022.

According to the Select Subcommittee's report, a Blueacorn operating agreement it obtained gave Noah Spirakus a 50 percent interest and Reis and Hockridge jointly the other 50 percent. The report estimated that stake could have entitled the couple to share roughly $129 million in distributions. Beginning around March 2021 Reis stepped back from day-to-day operations and the company installed an outside CEO, Barry Calhoun. Reis's own plea papers stipulate that he "remained in the conspiracy through in or around May 2021" even after stepping back.

On June 28, 2021 Reis and Hockridge filed a verified complaint and an application for an order to show cause against Spirakus in Maricopa County Superior Court. Spirakus filed a response opposing the application on July 16; on July 23 they filed a notice of voluntary dismissal without prejudice, and the court dismissed the case on July 27, 2021. The register does not state the claims (Reis and Hockridge v. Spirakus, No. CV2021-010252, register of actions). The operating agreement the report cites is dated May 26, 2021 (report, n. 199).

Their own relief

His factual resume stipulates that in April 2020, before Blueacorn's public launch, he obtained a fraudulent PPP loan of approximately $69,870 for Juuice Inc. by submitting fabricated tax documents that falsely claimed Juuice paid employees including himself and Hockridge. The resume lists a sequence of further fraudulent loans through 2020 and into 2021: Juuice LLC, Body Politix (twice), and loans tied to co-conspirators James Flores and Vivian Arriaga, among others. DOJ's summary at sentencing: Reis and his co-conspirators processed over 530 fraudulent loans, causing more than $65 million in losses.

Reis was charged in the Northern District of Texas (Fort Worth Division), case number 4:24-CR-287-O, before Chief District Judge Reed O'Connor. The original indictment was filed under seal on November 14, 2024 and unsealed by order of November 21, 2024; a superseding indictment followed on May 8, 2025, adding a forfeiture notice. The charges were one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud (18 U.S.C. § 1349) and four counts of wire fraud (18 U.S.C. § 1343). On November 21, 2024 Reis was arrested and had his initial appearance in the District of Puerto Rico; the same day Hockridge was served with a summons to appear in Fort Worth on November 25 (government's unopposed motion for a protective order, Doc. 11, p. 4).

Reis pleaded guilty, entering his plea to the conspiracy count on August 11, 2025, with the plea agreement and factual resume filed August 6. On December 18, 2025, Judge O'Connor sentenced him to 120 months (10 years) in prison, two years of supervised release, a $100 special assessment, and restitution of $66,038,049.27 to the SBA. The court imposed no fine, finding he lacked the resources to pay one. The judgment (ECF 390) reflects those figures; the remaining counts were dismissed on the government's motion. Most of the restitution is joint and several with his co-defendants; press coverage of the sentencing hearing reported that roughly $2.5 million was due from Reis individually within two weeks. The judgment orders $2,500,000.00 paid toward restitution within 14 days of its entry and directs Reis to list and sell two condominiums, Nos. 3301 and 5501 at 7000 Bahia Beach in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico, and apply the proceeds to restitution (judgment, Doc. 390, p. 4).

Reis had moved roughly $46 million into Nevada trusts (the Mint Legacy Trust and Mint Family Trust) in 2022. In April 2026 Judge O'Connor found those trusts subject to garnishment as nominee arrangements. The government announced in May 2026 that it expected to recover nearly $30 million through enforcement against the Reis and Hockridge trusts. Reis filed a notice of appeal to the Fifth Circuit on December 29, 2025.

On June 8, 2026 the court approved a stipulation between the government and both defendants that stays the final garnishment order (Doc. 456) until the appeals from it, which Reis, Hockridge and the trusts' family trustee filed on May 1, 2026, are finally decided. The same order directed SEI Private Trust Company to pay the balances of Reis's and Hockridge's individual accounts to the Clerk of Court (stipulation and order, Doc. 472). The Fifth Circuit docketed those appeals as No. 26-10440 (Reis) and No. 26-10441 (Hockridge) (Docs. 470, 471). On June 24, 2026 it granted the government's opposed motion to add Hockridge's sentencing transcript to the record of Reis's criminal appeal, No. 25-11394 (Doc. 476; docket on CourtListener).

The count of conviction concerns fabricated documents used to obtain loans for Reis and co-conspirators and the coaching of borrowers through Blueacorn's "VIPPP" program, as set out in the factual resume.

In Blueacorn's Delaware suit against PayNerd, PayNerd's third-party complaint of December 21, 2022 accused Reis, with Fin Cap and Noah Spirakus, of fraudulently inducing its first referral agreement. On August 16, 2023 the court denied Reis's motion to dismiss that claim, finding that PayNerd had alleged Reis himself made misrepresentations. It is an allegation, not a finding (Fin Cap Inc. v. PayNerd LLC, Del. Super. C.A. No. N21C-12-118 MMJ CCLD, opinion, Aug. 16, 2023).

Where they are now (2025–2026)

The court ordered Reis to surrender by January 20, 2026, with a recommendation for FCI Bastrop. The BOP's non-binding designation at sentencing was FCI Bastrop, Texas. He is appealing his conviction and sentence to the Fifth Circuit. After leaving Blueacorn he had relocated to Puerto Rico and registered a new entity, Lender Service Consultants LLC; in a February 10, 2026 order the court recorded the government's representation that he had defaulted on his restitution obligations. In a March 2025 motion asking to move the trial to the District of Arizona, he and Hockridge said they "currently reside in Puerto Rico" and also own a condominium in Scottsdale (motion to transfer venue, Doc. 75, pp. 4, 7).

Documents on this site

Original source documents and archived copies

  • Matthew "Matt" Mandell — his company Paynerd's fraudulent-inducement counterclaims against Reis personally survived Reis's motion to dismiss in Delaware in August 2023.
  • Michael Cota — charged in a case prosecuted alongside, but separately from, the Blueacorn founders' case.
  • Paynerd — its fraudulent-inducement counterclaims against Reis personally survived his motion to dismiss in Delaware in August 2023.
  • Taylor Hendricksen — Paynerd's fraudulent-inducement counterclaims against Reis personally survived his motion to dismiss in Delaware in August 2023.

Sources

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