Born in Ankara in 1993, Umut Balcı is an attorney and researcher. He is a legal professional with over 6 years of progressive experience in Turkey, Germany, Canada and the US. Since 2017 he works at the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey as an in house counsel. His area of practice includes both national and international financial regulations, contract managing and drafting, payments law, financial technologies and CBDCs as well as corporate law and criminal law. In addition to his work as an attorney at the Central Bank, during 2022 – 2023, hemaintained his PhD. dissertation research as a visiting scholar at the University of Minnesota Law School in Minneapolis and York University Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto. He was a recipient of the Study in Canada Scholarships by Global Affairs Canada and Turkish Scientific and Technological Research Council. In terms of his academic background, he studied law at the Ankara University Faculty of Law. He spent a year at the University of Mannheim (Germany) School of Law and Economics as an Erasmus scholar during his undergraduate studies. He granted a LLM degree on Public Law also from Ankara University Faculty of Law. Since 2020 he is a PhD. candidate on Public Law at the Hacettepe University Faculty of Law. He is admitted to the Ankara Bar Association. He speaks English and Turkish fluently and is a basic user of German.