Live trading
How to connect a wallet, turn on live trading with two signatures, and stay in control of the trading key.
Live trading means your orders, and your live copies, go to Hyperliquid with real money. Your money stays in your own Hyperliquid account the whole time. Tandem never holds it and can never withdraw or move it.
Live trading uses real money
Read Risks before you start.
What you need
An authenticator app
Set up on your tandem account.
A wallet
A browser extension, or any wallet through WalletConnect.
USDC on Hyperliquid
On your own Hyperliquid account.
Which network
Check the network named in your wallet and each live confirmation. Mainnet uses real money. Testnet uses separate test funds. A testnet result does not prove that your account can trade on mainnet, and enabling trading depends on the site's and your account's live-access settings.
The top bar names it once. With a practice account, the Paper | Mainnet switch at the top shows which account the page trades: its dot turns green while live trading is on. Without one, your wallet's button at the top says it, for example "Mainnet · Live". Each live order's confirmation names the network again. Once live trading is on for your wallet, the page opens on Mainnet.
While tandem opens mainnet step by step, some accounts can't turn on live trading there yet. Your wallet's dialog then says so, and offers nothing to enable.
Connect a wallet
Open Connect a wallet. The network is named beside the title. Tandem asks your wallet for its address and nothing else, and reads your account on that network with it. Nothing is signed until you enable live trading.
Wallets installed in your browser (for example Rabby, MetaMask or Coinbase Wallet) show up in the list. Choose yours and approve the connection in the wallet.
If the list is empty, add a wallet extension and open the dialog again.
Once connected, the dialog is called Your wallet. It shows your wallet and its address, the Live trading section, and Disconnect. If the page shows Paper, the section has one button, Switch to Mainnet, to show your wallet's account first. Disconnecting a WalletConnect wallet also ends its WalletConnect session.
Turn on live trading
In Your wallet, the section lists the three steps, numbered: the code, signature 1 of 2 and signature 2 of 2. Choose Enable live trading. The step under way is marked, and the one your wallet is asked to sign says "Approve it in your wallet".
Enter a code from your authenticator app
This confirms it is really you.
Approve 1 of 2: tandem's trading key
Your wallet asks you to sign an approval. It lets tandem's trading key place and cancel orders for your account for 90 days.
Approve 2 of 2: tandem's fee
Your wallet asks you to sign a second approval. It allows tandem's fee of 0.01% of each order (see Fees). If your wallet has approved this fee before, this step is skipped.
Your wallet signs both approvals on the Arbitrum One network. If it is on another network, it asks you to switch first. Signing costs no gas and sends no transaction.
Tandem then sends both approvals to Hyperliquid. When Hyperliquid shows both, the section says Live, the switch's dot at the top turns green, and your orders go to Hyperliquid.
If you stop halfway, the section shows what is still missing and Sign the approval (or Sign the approvals). You can also choose Start again. The approvals must be signed before the time shown, or you start again.
Only these two signatures
Enabling live trading uses these two approvals. Removing the key or moving your own USDC from spot to perps asks for a separate signature. Tandem never asks for your seed phrase or private key. Once enabled, its trading key can keep placing orders while your wallet is disconnected.
What the trading key can and cannot do
The trading key is a separate key that tandem makes for you on its server. Hyperliquid calls this an API wallet or agent. Only its address is ever shown to you or your wallet.
| The trading key can | The trading key cannot |
|---|---|
| Place, change and cancel orders on your Hyperliquid account. | Withdraw your money. |
| Set leverage. | Move or transfer your funds to anyone. |
| Run your live copies while your browser is closed. |
This is Hyperliquid's own rule for agent keys, not just a promise from tandem. The key is stored encrypted and is never shown, sent to your browser, or written to logs.
When the key ends
The trading key works for 90 days. The section says until when: "tandem's trading key places orders for this wallet until" a date.
- tandem reminds you 7 days before the end and again a day before, by push and email. The reminder's link opens the wallet dialog, where you renew.
- When the 90 days are over, choose Renew live trading. It takes one signature, or two if the fee approval is gone too. Until you do, your live copies stop; resume any copy that paused once the key is renewed.
- If Hyperliquid no longer shows one of the approvals (for example, you removed it elsewhere), live trading pauses and you enable it again.
Revoke the trading key
While live trading is on, the section shows Revoke. It asks once to be sure, then works at once and needs no code:
- tandem destroys your trading key straight away, so it can't place any more orders;
- then you are offered Remove it on Hyperliquid: one more signature that removes the key on Hyperliquid too.
Revoking does not close your positions or move your money. Orders already resting on Hyperliquid stay there until you cancel them.
Every live order is confirmed
Before a live order is sent, a short window shows it: the network, what it does (buy or sell, close, take profit and stop, leverage), its size and value, its price and its estimated liquidation price. Nothing is sent until you press its button. The order form shows the fees as rates, with this order's dollars when you hover them.
An order over one of your limits shows why in the same window, and it can't be sent: change the size and try again.
Don't show this again turns the window off for your later live orders: they go at once, with the same checks on tandem's server. Turn it back on under Settings › Trading › Live orders › Confirm live orders. The window always shows for your first live order, your first order on mainnet, and an order a limit refuses.
Limits and stops
Tandem's server checks every live order against limits before it signs it. These include:
- the largest value of one order;
- the total value sent in one day;
- the most you can lose in one day (realised losses and fees); once reached, only orders that reduce a position go through;
- the number of open orders;
- the highest leverage.
If an order goes past a limit, it is refused and nothing is sent. The message says which limit and by how much.
You see these limits, in plain words, under Settings › Trading › Safety › Caps. There you can also set your own caps: each one can only be lower than tandem's. Leave a field empty to keep tandem's. Saving asks for a fresh code from your authenticator app.
Your copy plan has its own limits too, such as Most to lose in one day and Stop everything after a drop of. See For You.
Stop: the kill switch
While you trade live, the top bar has a red Stop button. Press it, and tandem first reads your orders and positions and shows what it will do:
- cancel all your open orders;
- block new orders until you resume;
- pause all your live copies;
- and, if you switch on Close all positions at market, close every position too.
Nothing happens until you press Stop now. The button then reads Stopped. To trade again, open it and press Resume trading. Resuming reopens nothing: cancelled orders and closed positions stay that way.
The same switch is under Settings › Trading › Safety › Kill switch.
If the tandem team stops live trading on your account, the dialog says so and why, and only the team can lift it.
The dead man's switch
Under Settings › Trading › Safety, you can turn on the Dead man's switch. While it is on, Hyperliquid itself cancels your open orders if tandem stops renewing the switch, for example if tandem's server is down or loses its connection.
Your orders rest on Hyperliquid
Orders and stop losses already accepted by Hyperliquid stay there if tandem is down, unless cancelled or expired. A stop can still slip or fail to fill, and a halted market may prevent an exit. App-managed orders need tandem to keep running.
Live copies
Copying live is off until you turn it on, with New copies under Settings › Trading › Safety. When it is on, your new copies trade your live Hyperliquid account instead of practice money. Copies already running stay where they are. Each copy is tracked on its own, so you can see its fills and results in your Portfolio.
- A live copy can also be a countertrade: it takes the opposite side of every trade the trader makes, so if the trader wins, you lose.
- Live copies can follow a trader onto Hyperliquid's stock and commodity markets (HIP-3), inside each market's hours. They need your Hyperliquid account to be a unified account.
- Switching your account to unified keeps your running copies' plans: tandem reads the new mode before it scales anything down.
Alerts on your phone
Two switches under Settings › Trading › Safety send a push to your devices, even when tandem is closed:
- Push each fill: each time one of your live orders fills, with what was bought or sold and at what price. Not during your quiet hours.
- Push risk warnings: when a position's price comes within 10% of its liquidation price, and when the day's loss reaches 80% of your loss cap. These come during quiet hours too.
Switch push on for a device in Alerts first.
With tandem open, each live fill also shows in the bar at the top with its sound, as a practice fill does, whatever the switches above say. The bell's mute and your quiet hours keep it quiet.