That is the warning from the RBoS Shareholders Action Group which has finally lodged its £4 billion claim against four former RBS directors on behalf of 12,000 small investors and 100 large shareholders including local authority pension funds, churches, charities and several major Scottish institutions.

But there is no such prospect ahead for former shareholders in the crashed HBoS, whose mismanagement was yesterday detailed in damning terms for the first time in a parliamentary report.