Count Kelly King, one of the nation's top banking executives, among the voices saying that the financial crisis that began in 2007 is over.
But King, the chairman and chief executive of BB&T Corp., cautioned at Tuesday's economic-forecast luncheon that a "nice, steady recovery is not likely going to happen."
The luncheon, sponsored by the Winston-Salem Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary Club of Winston-Salem, drew a record 746 in attendance at Benton Convention Center.
King compared the local and national recoveries to the speed-up, hit-the-brakes way that traffic on the interstate often tries to get rolling after a major slowdown or shutdown.
"It's more a matter of where do we go from here rather than dwelling on how we got here," King said.
King said, as he has recently with analysts, that he bases his optimism on three developments in the past four months.
"The election results removed a lot of the uncertainty in the marketplace, putting decision-makers in a much better place to move forward with some degree of certainty," King said.
He also cited the Federal Reserve's decision to try to jump-start the U.S. economy by buying $600 billion in Treasury bonds, and the compromise reached on federal tax-cut extensions.
Although King said "we're clearly moving in the right direction and recovering, there are still some sticky issues." Foremost among those issues are high unemployment and declining housing values.
He expressed confidence that an increase in hiring will take place, possibly as early as the second half of the year.
BB&T said in December that it plans to create several hundred revenue-producing jobs throughout its territory this year, including potentially 100 to 150 in Winston-Salem.
King said he believes that while housing values may be at or nearing the bottom of price declines, they will go up and down over the next few years.
Even though King focused on economic projections, he said we would be remiss to not recognize the lessons learned — whether at BB&T or in the economy —– from the recession.
"We paid the tuition, so it's important to get the education," he quipped.
He said businesses and government must do a better job balancing the challenges and opportunities presented by investment and debt. He stressed that cutting spending should be a nonpartisan issue.
Too many companies, and too many individuals, took on too much risk, "betting big and losing big," King said.
He said companies and individuals learned the hard way they can't sustain spending more than they produce in revenue and income.
King said he doesn't envy the task before the General Assembly in trying to resolve the state's $3.7 billion budget shortfall. Still, he is convinced spending cuts have to take priority over any tax-increase considerations.
"We can't correct excesses without doing tough things," King said. "We can't resolve the problems in North Carolina with new taxes."
rcraver@wsjournal.com
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