API down?

Hey, is the trade API down? Started getting json decoder errors. Debugged the response, got this: <Response [403]>

res = requests.post(f'https://www.pathofexile.com/api/trade/exchange/{league}', json=j)
print('response: ', res)
jres = res.json()```

Returns: 

``` python
File ".../PycharmProjects/untitled/venv/path-of-exile-python-3-sample-tools-master/poe_watchclip.py", line 152, in query_exchange
    jres = res.json()
  File "...\PycharmProjects\untitled\venv\lib\site-packages\requests\models.py", line 898, in json
    return complexjson.loads(self.text, **kwargs)
  File "...\Python\Python38-32\lib\json\__init__.py", line 357, in loads
    return _default_decoder.decode(s)
  File "...\Python\Python38-32\lib\json\decoder.py", line 337, in decode
    obj, end = self.raw_decode(s, idx=_w(s, 0).end())
  File "...\Python\Python38-32\lib\json\decoder.py", line 355, in raw_decode
    raise JSONDecodeError("Expecting value", s, err.value) from None
json.decoder.JSONDecodeError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)
response:  <Response [403]>

Process finished with exit code 1

There isn't anything wrong with the function parameters, just trying to get some currency prices. It was working fine for months till a few days ago, haven't changed the code since. Suspecting its just a problem with poe servers? Since the response 403 is a HTTP status code (forbidden page). Thanks