How to create a read-only Bitstamp API key

Open Bitstamp API access ↗

We checked these steps against Bitstamp's own documentation on 25 September 2026. Bitstamp can rename a button at any time. If a label differs, look for the same permission.

Before you start

• If your account is with Bitstamp Europe (EEA or Switzerland) and it is a personal account: Bitstamp is moving these accounts to the Robinhood app, and it is doing it GROUP BY GROUP, not on one date. Bitstamp invited the first group on 15 October 2026 and says that group's old Bitstamp interface becomes read-only on 14 November 2026, with history and statements still there. Later groups get their own invitation and their own date, so yours may be after that. Bitstamp has not said whether API keys keep working once an account is read-only, so this connection may stop updating — and you will not know the date in advance. Institutional and corporate Bitstamp accounts are not part of the move.
• Use a computer, and make sure you can log in to Bitstamp there.
• You need access to the email address on your Bitstamp account, because the new key is confirmed by email.
• If you use two-factor login on Bitstamp, keep your code app handy.

Permissions

Turn on only:

• Only the permission that lets the key view balances (Bitstamp may call it Account balance, View account balances, or Read main account balances and transactions). If balances and transactions share one viewing option, that is fine.

Keep these off:

• Any order or trading permission
• Any withdrawal permission
• Any deposit permission
• Any transfer permission
• Any Earn permission
• Any derivatives permission

Steps

Sovereign connects to Bitstamp from one fixed IP address. The connection form in Sovereign shows it next to these steps, with a copy button.

1. Log in to Bitstamp and open the API page with the button above.
2. Click the button to create a new API key.
3. In the new-key form, switch on the advanced settings.
4. In the IP address field, paste Sovereign's IP address. Add only that one address.
5. Tick only the permission that lets the key view account balances. Leave every other permission off.
6. Create the key. If Bitstamp asks for your two-factor code, enter it and confirm.
7. Copy the API key and the API secret now, before you activate the key.
8. Click the button to activate the key.
9. Open the email Bitstamp sends you and click the confirmation link. The key only works after this.
10. Paste the key into “API KEY” and the secret into “API SECRET” above, then press “Connect & Sync”.

Where each value goes in Sovereign:

• Your API key → API KEY
• Your API secret → API SECRET

Does a Bitstamp API key expire?

• With an IP restriction: No published expiry rule.
• Without an IP restriction: No published expiry rule.

Bitstamp publishes no clear expiry rule. If the key stops working, Sovereign marks the connection as expired and asks for a new key.

Bitstamp ties each new key to your Main Account or to one sub-account and you can't move it later, so keep the Main Account unless you want to track a sub-account. Sovereign reads that one account's balances only, and staked or lent (Earn) coins and derivatives balances may not appear.

If something goes wrong

• If the connection fails with “IP address not allowed”: the IP was mistyped or missing, so create a new key with Sovereign's IP.
• If the key is refused right after you connect: check that you activated it and clicked the link in Bitstamp's email.
• If you lost the API secret: delete the key in Bitstamp and create a new one.
• If Bitstamp has frozen your account or is missing tax (FATCA) details: a new key won't help, so fix it in your Bitstamp profile or with Bitstamp support.
• If the API page is missing, or the key stops working, after 14 November 2026 on a Bitstamp Europe personal account: that is the move to the Robinhood app, not a problem with your key. Ask Bitstamp support whether API access continues for your account, and in the meantime import a Bitstamp statement instead.

Sources

• www.bitstamp.net/api/
• www.bitstamp.net/legal/terms-of-use/sa/
• www.bitstamp.net/faq/how-do-i-create-and-manage-subaccounts/
• blog.bitstamp.net/post/api-key-implementation/
• blog.bitstamp.net/post/account-access-update-for-bitstamp-europe-retail-users/