Fat Finger or fat fingering a transaction refers to inadvertently using the wrong transaction details when buying, selling, or transferring cryptocurrency.
Examples of fat fingering come in many shapes and forms.
Some examples include;
- entering the wrong entry or exit price for a trade,
- selecting long (buy) instead of short (sell) from a trading platform,
- unknowingly adding or subtracting extra digits to the amount of currency you want to buy or sell,
- entering the wrong wallet address when transferring funds between wallets.
This can occur for a variety of reasons, such as a trader FOMOing into a trade because he’s in a hurry trying to catch a move.
But the primary reason fat fingering happens is because the user isn’t paying attention, and submits the transaction before double-checking that all of the information is correct.
Many crypto exchanges and trading apps now give users the ability to turn on and off an extra confirmation step before submitting a buy/sell/transfer order.
While it can slow down the overall process, traders can benefit by being able to review their trades and transfers before they are submitted.