Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from Craig Maurer - CLSA.
Craig Maurer - CLSA
A quick question on the U.K. You know, if you go back a number of years, the discussion around the U.K. when the consumer originally started to crack in terms of the credit card industry was there was that your feeling was that this was an economy that you wanted to bide your time in, that it would provide you with growth similar to what the U.S. went through during the big boom in the U.S. credit card industry. Considering the regulatory changes there and the obvious changes in the environment, do you still feel the same way about the U.K. economy?
Richard D. Fairbank
Craig, I think the U.K. is a less resilient card business than we have in the U.S. And I think the challenge there is really the confluence of the - I think there's an economic downturn in both countries, obviously. I think that the consumer started, certainly the credit card consumer started in a sort of less resilient position going into this particular downturn right now in the U.K. And then the very significant limitations that came from the regulatory decisions that were made there and, in fact, the overhang of regulatory risk that still exists in the U.K., all that collectively makes that business a less resilient business than our U.S. Card business.
Now, you know, in some ways that's a bit of a tough comparison because I haven't experienced a lending business in my entire career that is as robust and resilient as the U.S. credit card business. But I do want to say it's a whole notch less resilient and more constrained in that sense.
So what we are doing, Craig, is just really hunkering down and trying to, as conservatively as we can, manage during this downturn. So you will notice, in fact, that we have engineered about a 20% reduction in the size of the portfolio over the last number of quarters, basically. The standard for new originations is a very high bar, and we are okay with shrinking the business.
Our goal here is to try to - in many ways it's a parallel to Auto and some of the other businesses - retreat to the highest ground segments and very conservative underwriting and manage costs incredibly aggressively. We just finished an extensive in many ways transformation of the cost structure of the U.K. Card business with our outsourcing execution that we did in the second quarter.
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