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I am grateful to Malgorzata Kalbarczyk for excellent research assistance and to Thierry Tressel, Philippe Aghion, Georges de Menil, Laszlo Halpern and Jean-François Nivet for comments on earlier versions. This paper has benefited from the comments of two anonymous referees. This paper explores the relationship between ownership structure and firm value in firms listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. The results of the estimations, taking into account simultaneity and reverse causality, show that the relationship between ownership concentration and firm value differs across firms belonging to the sector of innovative technologies and more ‘mature ’ firms. The results give support to the hypothesis that ‘mature ’ firms with higher ownership concentration are likely to perform better than firms with more dispersed ownership. On the other hand, in high-tech companies, with large share of knowledge related activities, higher ownership concentration is associated with lower firm value. This effect is robust to various alternative specifications. halshs-00587856, version 1- 21 Apr 2011 2 1. Introduction. Why do certain firms have large block holders and others do not? Does it matter for corporat