BB&T To Buy Benefits Firm

By Staff Writer

May 07, 2002 at 08:00 PM

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NU Online News Service, May 7, 10:55 a.m. – BB&T Corp., Winston-Salem, N.C., today announced plans to buy Hunt, DuPree, Rhine & Associates Inc., Greenville, S.C., an employee benefits and investment advisory firm.

BB&T hopes to complete the transaction in June. Terms were not disclosed.

BB&T is regional bank holding company that also owns an insurance brokerage unit and other financial services operations.

BB&T says it will combine the 70-year-old Hunt, DuPree with W.E. Stanley & Co. Inc., a Greensboro, N.C.-based actuarial and employee benefits consulting company that BB&T bought in 1998.

The new firm will be called Stanley, Hunt, DuPree & Rhine Inc.

Stanley, Hunt will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Branch Banking and Trust Company, with more than 200 employees and dual headquarters in Greensboro and Greenville.

Phillip Floyd, president of W.E. Stanley, will be the chief executive officer of the combined company, and Chip Hunt, president of Hunt, DuPree, will be the president.

The combined company will sell insurance, investment consulting services, actuarial services, benefit communications and 401(k) and Section 125 flexible benefits programs.

Major markets will include the larger cities in Alabama, Georgia, Maryland, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia as well as the Carolinas, BB&T says.

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