Prudential Financial's Japanese subsidiary says some employees removed information from contracted agencies

March 6 (Reuters) - Prudential Financial's PRU.N Japanese life insurance subsidiary said on Friday that some workers assigned to contracted agencies improperly removed operational information and shared it with other employees.

The company reported that 11 employees took operational information on 379 occasions at seven agencies and shared it with other Prudential staff, who used the data to help plan sales promotion strategies.

It said the information that was taken related to operational matters, including sales performance at the agencies.

The development comes after the CEO of Prudential's Japanese life insurance unit resigned last month, following revelations of misconduct by about 100 of its employees totaling about 3.1 billion yen.

"Both the seconded employees who removed the information and the employees who received it lacked a fundamental understanding of the rules and failed to perform basic compliance actions," Prudential Gibraltar Financial Life Insurance said in a statement.

It will eliminate its life insurance secondments by the end of March, the company said, adding that some former and current executives will voluntarily return a portion of their compensation.

"After confirming the content of all cases with the agencies, no issues were identified that would raise concerns under the Unfair Competition Prevention Act, nor was there any inappropriate removal of contract information," it added.

Shares of the Prudential, the parent company, were down 3.4% in morning trading.

($1 = 158.0700 yen)