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This article attempts to answer the following questions: Who ultimately owns firms listed in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries? Does ownership structure depend on the institutional context? How does ownership affect firm performance? Do institutional factors influence the ownership–performance relationship?

We apply univariate analyses and generalised methods of moments estimations for a sample of 692 GCC listed firms during 2009–2015.

Our results reveal that corporations are mainly controlled by the state or families, the ownership structure is highly concentrated and pyramid structures are common in the region. Ownership is more concentrated in non-financial than financial firms, and ownership concentration and shareholder identity differ by institutional country setting. Finally, ownership concentration does not influence performance, but formal institutions play a moderating role in the relationship.

As our findings reveal potential type II agency problems due to ownership concentration, policymakers should raise awareness of professional corporate governance practices and tailor them to GCC countries’ institutional contexts.

Even with the introduction of new regulations by some GCC states to protect minority investors and promote corporate governance practices, ownership concentration is a rigid structure, and its use by investors to protect their economic endowment and power is culturally embedded.

Although previous studies have analysed ownership concentration and large shareholders’ identities across countries, this study fills a research gap investigating this phenomenon in-depth in emerging economies.

This study investigates the relationship between family-managed firms and firm employment growth by considering the effects of location and economic crisis as moderating variables.

The study uses random-effect models on a large panel dataset of Spanish manufacturing firms covering 2003 to 2015 to estimate the joint effects of municipality size and economic crisis on firm employment growth.

The analysis reveals a positive association between family-managed firms and employment growth. However, this association is not uniform across space and time. When it considers location, the study finds that municipality size positively affects employment growth in family-managed firms but not in non-family firms. Additionally, while the study reveals that both firm types experience negative employment growth during the early stage of the global economic crisis (2007–08), it also finds that family-managed firms located in small municipalities downsize less than their non-family counterparts.

This study provides new evidence on the resilience of family-managed firms during economic crises, particularly those located in geographically bounded settings, such as small municipalities. When an adverse event, such as an economic crisis, jeopardizes employment levels, the embedded and trust-based relationships, between a family firm and its community leads them to prioritize employees' claims. However, family-managed firms' commitment to preserve jobs in small municipalities cannot be maintained over the long term; this effect disappears if the economic crisis is protracted. This study sheds new light on family-managed firms' distinctive behavior toward with local communities.