Filippos Sachinidis was born in Canada in 1963. He studied Economics at the University of Piraeus and earned his Master of Arts in Economics from Queens College of New York. In 1994, he obtained a Ph.D. from the University of Manchester.

 He is an economist for the National Bank of Greece and served as an economic advisor to Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis from 2000 to 2004. He taught economics at the Manchester School of Management at UMIST from 1991 to 1993, and worked at the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research (IOBE) in Greece from 1996 to 1997.

In 2007, he was elected as a Member of Parliament for the Larissa constituency with the PASOK party. He was re-elected in 2009 and twice in the 2012 elections. In October 2009, he became Deputy Minister of Finance in the PASOK government led by George Papandreou. In June 2011, he assumed the position of Alternate Minister of Finance and, in March 2012, he became Minister of Finance. He is a member of the Executive Political Council of PASOK - Movement for Change.