In the paper the relationship between market orientation and performance, and the effect of the business environment on these two factors in an emerging economy, in Hungary, was investigated. In a research conducted at 572 firms we found that both market orientation and the business environment have an effect on business performance, albeit in a different manner. The three components of the market orientation construct (customer orientation, competitor orientation, interfunctional coordination) have a positive effect on performance. Contrary to that, environmental variables (technological turbulence, market turbulence, competitive intensity, buyer power etc.) proved to have a signficant impact only on the finance-based performance measures. The results provide unambiguous evidence that the environment has a strong effect on market orientation, indicating that the market orientation scale developed by Narver and Slater is a proper tool to describe the transitional processes in an emerging economy characterized by high turbulence