Does ownership matter in publicly listed tourism firms? Evidence from Jordan

•We provide new evidence on the relationship between ownership structure and firm performance.•Our results show that institutional investors are self-opportunistic and negatively affect firm performance.•We report a negative relationship between foreign ownership and firm performance.•We also detect that mutual funds have a positive impact on firm performance.

This paper aims to provide new evidence on the relationship between ownership structure and firm performance. Unlike the previous empirical studies in the area of firm performance, we examine this relationship within a unique setting of publicly listed tourism firms. Our contribution is extended by investigating this relationship in Jordan as an emerging market and a famous tourist destination in the region. This is an interesting setting since ownership is more concentrated in the investigated firms. Our results show that institutional investors are self-opportunistic and negatively affect firm performance. In addition, we report that foreign investors holding a minimum stake in a firm tend not to act as a monitoring device. Furthermore, we detect that mutual funds have a positive impact on firm performance. Finally, the findings of this paper provide interesting empirical implications to academics and policy makers.