Standard Chartered is wrangling with the New York state financial regulator over a finding - which may lead to sanctions - that for 10 years it "schemed with the government of Iran and hid from regulators roughly 60,000 secret transactions, involving at least US$250 billion, and reaping [the bank] hundreds of millions of dollars in fees."Standard Chartered for its part contends that the transactions in dispute comprise no more than US$14 million in payments, that it voluntarily reported the issue to US regulators in 2010 and voiced surprise at the actions of the state (rather than federal) regulators.According to the UK-based but primarily Asian-focused bank, the ruling of the New York State Department of Financial Services "is incorrect as a matter of law."The bank went on to assert that its review of Iranian-linked payments "did not identify a single payment on behalf of any party that was designated at the time by the US Government as a terrorist entity or organisation."For its part the state regulator found that the bank systematically engaged in deceptive and fraudulent misconduct on behalf of Iranian  financial institutions subject to US economic sanctions "and then covered up its transgressions".Counterparties involved included the Central Bank of Iran, Bank Saderat and Bank Melli.A commentary by Reuters on the affair reported that Standard Chartered systematically removed from wire transfer payment messages all references to Iranian entities before submitting them to the New York branch.When bank employees determined that it was necessary to "repair" payment messages with references to Iranian entities, they "did so by stripping the message of unwanted data, replacing it with false entries or by returning the payment message to the Iranian client for wire stripping and resubmission," the New York regulator wrote.According to Reuters, this process, commonly known as "stripping," was once common practice among some European banks. However, in recent years the US Justice Department and the New York County District Attorney's Office have levied fines of several billion dollars against major banks.Sanctions threatened by the New York regulator include cancelling the licence of Standard Chartered to trade in New York state and cancelling its licence to engage in US dollar clearing operations.