Abstract: This study examines the empirical effect of the relationship between corporate social activities and firm performance in the state-owned enterprises (SOEs). This paper focuses upon the SOE context due to specific regulations for this kind of company. This study analyzed the individual performance and industry-adjusted firm performance for both SOE and non-SOE. Based upon 683 firm-year observations, we found that corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities improve firm performance. Moreover, SOEs do not moderate the relationship between CSR activities and company performance. However, the subgroup analysis demonstrated different result. CSR significantly affects firm performance for the non-SOE companies and vice versa for the SOEs. This finding indicates that CSR activities as mandatory for SOEs might be the factor that caused the insignificant effect towards the SOEs’ performance. The research implicates to the regulators to set standards or guidelines for sustainability practices, especially for SOEs.