Tim Blaxter, a consultant and angel investor who has worked with Scottish Enterprise, has invested through Crowdcube, which opened an office in Edinburgh late last year.

He says: "I think a lot of people are investing £10 or £100, spreading themselves very thin. If they spread their money across 10 to 20 investments, it is 80% luck anyway, they will probably make a return on some of them."

But he is wary of the way in which some start-up businesses pitch themselves on crowdfunding platforms, sometimes showing what he says are "absurd valuations" based on highly optimistic assumptions.

Blaxter says: "It is the Wild West. You could be asked to invest in people who have no experience, no assets, no intellectual property, no product. The safest way is to go in alongside a major investor who is in there already."