Nearly half of millennials would invest part of their pension in cryptocurrencies if they could, research suggests.

Forty percent of people born between 1981 and the mid-1990s would like cryptocurrencies in their pensions savings. The asset class has less appeal for older generations – for example, only 7% of the baby-boomer generation felt the same way.

Other generations – known as ‘generation X’ and ‘the silent generation’ – would add cryptocurrencies to their pension portfolios in 10% of cases, according to the CoreData Research, which surveyed 500 UK retail investors.

Yet the report also found investors had concerns about investing pension pots in cryptocurrencies and other new areas, such as medicinal cannabis. Almost half said their biggest concern was about investing in a sector that could be unregulated and open to fraud, while more than a third worried that the risks involved were not yet understood.