The Bitcoin boom and bust of 2018 was a “gateway drug” that hooked millennials into stock market trading, the founder of rising fintech company Freetrade has claimed.

Adam Dodds, chief executive of the London-based start-up, believes the drama that surrounded the collapse of the controversial cryptocurrency converted young people into investors.

“It was a kind of gateway drug... but instead of pot to heroin, it was a drug to something better,” said the Canadian entrepreneur, who launched his stock trading app last month.

Bitcoin went from a peak value of just under $20,000 in December 2017 to around $3,500 in September 2017.

Mr Dodds said the surge in Bitcoin prices switched a lot of young people on to traditional investing, after they saw an opportunity with the digital currency.