Getting started with Bitfinex on Autoview
By the end of this guide your Bitfinex account is connected to Autoview, your API key carries the right permissions, and you've placed one real test order and cancelled it. The cancel matters as much as the order. A dry run proves your syntax parses. Only a live order proves the whole chain works end to end.
What Autoview does with Bitfinex
Autoview places orders on Bitfinex for you when an alert fires. You connect your account once by handing Autoview an API key. After that, a signal comes in, Autoview reads the command in it, and it submits the order to Bitfinex on your behalf. Your password never enters the picture.
The engine is a webhook that lives on our servers. It accepts a POST from anywhere and runs around the clock, whether or not any browser is open. TradingView is the common sender, but it isn't the only one. A TrendSpider alert, a Python script, your own cron job, anything that can POST will trigger the same execution. The Chrome extension is the piece tied directly to TradingView; the webhook platform is source-agnostic.
Create an API key on Bitfinex
You generate the key inside Bitfinex, not inside Autoview. Sign in, open your account menu, and go to the API section. Bitfinex keeps its own walkthrough current, so follow theirs for the exact screens: Bitfinex API documentation.
Bitfinex keys carry granular per-scope permissions. Set them deliberately:
- Grant order read and write. Autoview needs to place and cancel orders, and read your balances and open positions. Without order permission, nothing executes.
- Leave withdrawal off. No automation strategy needs it. A key that can't move funds off Bitfinex is a key that can't drain your account if it ever leaks.
Bitfinex emails you to confirm a new key before it goes active. Open that mail, click through to create the key, and then copy both values off the page that loads. You'll need the API key and the API key secret. Keep the secret somewhere safe. Bitfinex shows it once.
Add the keys to Autoview
Open your Bitfinex configuration in Autoview. Two fields wait for you, and they map straight to what Bitfinex just handed you:
- API key is the public key.
- API key secret is the private half.
There is no passphrase field for Bitfinex. Paste both values, run the credential test, and watch for the confirmation that the account connected. A green result means Bitfinex accepted the key and it can read your balances. A red one usually means a paste slip or a missing permission. Save when it's green.
Fire a dry run with d=1
Before any live order, prove the command parses. Add d=1 to it. Autoview reads the whole command, shows you exactly what it would have sent to Bitfinex, and submits nothing. Get a clean dry run first.
Bitfinex pairs use the plain ticker. Bitcoin against the dollar is BTCUSD, Ether against the dollar is ETHUSD. Skip the t prefix you may see in Bitfinex's own v2 docs; Autoview talks to the v1 pair list, which stores them un-prefixed. Put the plain pair in s=. A dry-run limit buy 5% under the market reads:
- Extension:
e=bitfinex s=BTCUSD b=buy p=-5% q=0.001 d=1 - Webhook:
s=BTCUSD b=buy p=-5% q=0.001 d=1
The only difference is e=bitfinex, the exchange code that tells the extension where to route. On the webhook platform the webhook already knows its exchange, so you drop it.
That example hard-codes the price offset and quantity, which is what you want for a controlled test. In live use you'll often feed a value in from the alert instead. A TradingView alert can write one with p={{close}}, which tells TradingView to substitute the candle's close at fire time. Autoview just receives a number. The {{close}} token is TradingView's, not Autoview's. The sender supplies the value, so a Python script or another platform builds the same command its own way and posts a plain number where {{close}} would sit.
Go live, then cancel
Once the dry run is clean, drop d=1 and send the real thing. A word of caution first. Bitfinex orders hit your live account. There's no sandbox order here, so trade a size at or above the pair's minimum and place a limit far enough from the market that it won't fill while you test.
- Extension:
e=bitfinex s=BTCUSD b=buy p=-5% q=0.001 - Webhook:
s=BTCUSD b=buy p=-5% q=0.001
Fire it, then open the Autoview log and your Bitfinex orders. You should see the resting limit order in both places. Now cancel it:
- Extension:
e=bitfinex s=BTCUSD c=order - Webhook:
s=BTCUSD c=order
Order placed, order cancelled, both confirmed in the log and on Bitfinex. That's the full round trip, and your setup works.
When something snags
Most first-run problems are one of three things.
- Invalid credentials. Autoview rejects the key. Almost always a typo on paste, or a key created without order permission. Re-paste both halves and confirm the permission on Bitfinex.
- Account shows disconnected. Nothing executes while it does. Re-check the key, and confirm any IP restriction you set on Bitfinex matches where Autoview sends from.
- Bitfinex rejects the order. The error in your log comes straight from Bitfinex, often because the size sat below the pair's minimum, or the pair isn't a valid Bitfinex symbol. Confirm the plain pair (
BTCUSD, nottBTCUSD) and bump the size.
Bitfinex commands carry more than buy and sell. You can layer stop, trailing-stop, fill-or-kill, and post-only behavior onto these same orders, plus stop-loss and take-profit parameters. Get the round trip working first. The rest builds on it.