The Spring 2008 Marketing Trends Survey reveals that marketers remain surprisingly upbeat about their own organisations’ prospects – even if they are increasingly gloomy about the UK’s economic outlook, the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) said on 12 June.

Up to 15,000 estate agents are likely to lose their jobs as a result of the downturn in the property market, a leading think-tank claims. The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) estimates this represents some 5% of the sector’s total workforce.

As predicted, interest rates have been held while the Bank of England battles to keep a lid on inflation. The Monetary Policy Committee had little room for manoeuvre and today voted to maintain the official Bank Rate paid on commercial bank reserves at 5.0%.

Paper voucher-based schemes still dominate the business-to-business voucher incentive market, according to detailed sales data on the voucher, gift card and stored value solutions industry available for the first time.

Leading American investment bank JP Morgan is predicting that some 40,000 jobs will be lost in the City of London during the next two years. That’s double the amount forecast by the Centre for Economics and Business Research earlier this week.

The City will lose 11,000 jobs this year and a further 8,200 will be shed in 2009 as a result of the credit crunch. That’s the view of forecasters the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR).

House prices fell by 2.5% in March according to the Halifax House Price Index. Prices in the first quarter of 2008 were 1.0% lower than in the last quarter of 2007. However, house prices in March were still up 1.1% compared with a year earlier.

Sales organisations are disappointingly unprepared for this year’s challenging market conditions says consultancy IDC.

95% of mortgage brokers predict further challenges this year following on from the recent credit crunch, a study by GE Money Home Lending indicates.

The latest Marketing Trends Survey from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) indicates that there is widespread pessimism about whether 2008 sales plans will be overachieved or are likely to prove challenging.