Comment: 40 pages, 7 tables, 1 figureWe explore how institutional quality moderates the effectiveness of privatization on entrepreneurs sales performance. To do this, we blend agency theory and entrepreneurial cognition theory with insights from institutional economics to develop a model of emerging market venture performance. Using data from the World Banks Enterprise Survey of entrepreneurs in China, our results suggest that private-owned enterprises (POEs) outperform state-owned enterprises (SOEs) but only in environments with high-quality market institutions. In environments with low-quality market institutions, SOEs outperform POEs. These findings suggest that the effectiveness of privatization on entrepreneurial performance is context-specific, which reveals more nuance than previously has been attributed.