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Common mistakes

Wrong network

A wallet connected to Ethereum mainnet, Arbitrum or anything other than Robinhood Chain cannot trade on Frontier. The app prompts to switch. Balances shown by a wallet are per network: an empty balance often means the wallet is looking at the wrong one.

No ETH left for gas

Every transaction costs gas in ETH, separately from the trade. Spending the entire balance on a coin leaves nothing to pay for the next transaction, including the sale. The app holds back a small amount on a full-balance buy, but a wallet funded with exactly the trade amount will still fail.

Buying a copy

Names, symbols and images are chosen freely by whoever creates a coin, and duplicates are common. Two coins can look identical everywhere except in their address. Check the address on the coin page against the one shared with you, on the explorer if in doubt.

Sending a coin that cannot be sent

While a coin is on its bonding curve it cannot be transferred wallet to wallet. Buying and selling on the curve works; transfers fail. Every restriction lifts at graduation. See The bonding curve.

Slippage set blindly

A tolerance of 50% on a thin market permits a fill far from the quoted price. A tolerance of 0.1% on a moving coin cancels most trades and costs gas each time. The presets are a reasonable starting point; the warning above 10% exists for a reason.

Assuming every coin behaves the same way

This one is specific to Frontier. Because a creator configures their coin's market at creation, two coins can behave differently in ways that matter to a trade:

  • the fee is not a platform rate. It can follow volatility, be flat, or be anything the creator set up to the 10% ceiling, which a declared sniper tax window lifts for its duration;
  • a coin in its first minutes may be running an sniper tax, which starts as high as 50% and decays;
  • where the fees go differs too, including coins whose entire creator income is paid to whoever stakes them.

All of it is published before anyone can buy, and none of it can change afterwards, so it is readable rather than surprising — as long as it is read. The coin's page states its fee and the blocks running on it. See Pre-trade checks.

Trading a coin nobody has checked

Deep liquidity at graduation is not demand, and nothing about being listed on Frontier makes a coin a good buy. Pre-trade checks lists what can be verified in a minute, and Risks is the honest version of what can still go wrong.