CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Winston-Salem-based BB&T Corp. and SunTrust Banks Inc. of Atlanta have officially become Truist Financial Corp. The largest bank merger of the year closed Friday, 10 months after it was first announced.
Truist’s headquarters is in Hearst Tower in uptown Charlotte. The newly formed bank is leasing 561,000 square feet of the 970,000-square-foot tower, which it has the option to buy for $455.5 million. Truist is expected to exercise that option in the first quarter. The headquarters will eventually house as many as 2,000 people.
[PAST COVERAGE: BB&T, SunTrust bank merger closes bringing new headquarters to Charlotte]
BB&T CEO Kelly King is chairman and chief executive of the combined bank until Sept. 12, 2021. SunTrust CEO Bill Rogers, who is president and chief operating officer of Truist, will then take the helm. Rogers will become chairman on March 12, 2022.
“It’s really exciting to see it become reality because, when you start on a process like this, you know what’s going to happen, but along the way, it’s pretty easy to get caught up in the trees and miss the forest,” King told the Charlotte Business Journal.
CBJ caught up with him last week to get an update on the merger and talk about the next steps in building Truist. Read excerpts from that interview here.