Locusts raze crops, gardens and even football pitches in hours. A single swarm of these frightful creatures can count up to 40bn insects and in less than a day it can eat as much food as would tens of thousands of people.

This must have been the image that Franz Muntefering, chairman of Germany’s then-ruling SDP party, had in mind last year when he denounced private equity investors as locusts stripping bare German companies before moving on to the next feeding frenzy.