Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) -- New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg proposed creating a privately run fund to loan up to $250,000 to local start-up companies, among several plans to encourage entrepreneurship and attract new financial firms.

The “angel fund” is one of 11 proposals to spur growth in the city’s financial services industry, Bloomberg said during the announcement at 160 Varick St., site of the first city-sponsored “business incubator,” with office space for about 100 entrepreneurs that costs about $200 a month.

“We are taking aggressive steps to put the city in the best position to capture growth, and we’re doing it by promoting one thing more than any other -- innovation,“ Bloomberg said in prepared remarks.

High levels of compensation, corporate earnings and capital gains from Wall Street activity accounted for as much as 12 percent of city tax collections in the most profitable years. Employment in the city’s securities industry declined by 10 percent to 168,600 jobs in December 2008 from 187,800 in October 2007, according to State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s office.

“The initiatives we’re outlining today are aimed at retaining and expanding the cluster of businesses and institutions that has made the city the global financial services capital, while simultaneously fostering those new ideas that will keep the city competitive for decades to come,” said Robert Lieber, Bloomberg’s deputy mayor for economic development.

‘VC Connect’

Among the other proposals, the city intends to create a “VC Connect” Web site that links venture capitalists and financial training opportunities with people trying to start businesses. An annual competition will seek ideas from “groundbreaking financial services start-up companies,” the mayor’s office said.

More than $30 million in newly available federal funds will be spent on incentives to attract new financial services firms to lower Manhattan. City officials also will begin an international marketing campaign to lure companies, the mayor’s office said.

The city will help stock exchanges and clearing institutions such as the New York Mercantile Exchange’s Green Exchange and SecondMarket to capture business in emerging asset markets such as carbon credits and find inexpensive office locations, the mayor’s office said.

Joining the mayor in the announcement were Polytechnic Institute of New York University President Jerry MacArthur Hultin; Trinity Real Estate President Carl Weisbrod; Google Americas Operations President Tim Armstrong; SecondMarket Founder and CEO Barry Silbert; SUNY Levin Institute President Garrick Utley; Kauffman Foundation FastTrac Program Director Monica Doss, and New York University Provost David McLaughlin.

The mayor is founder and majority owner of Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP.

To contact the reporter on this story: Henry Goldman in New York City Hall at hgoldman@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: February 18, 2009 12:30 EST