Shutterstock Stock Dives After Hours After Getty Moves to Terminate Merger Deal: What You Should Know

Shutterstock Inc (NYSE:SSTK)  shares plunged in after-hours trading Tuesday after Getty Images Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:GETY) said it plans to terminate its merger agreement with the company following regulatory pressure in the U.K.

SSTK closed Tuesday’s regular session at $13.95, down 1.27%. In after-hours trading, shares fell to $10.01, down 28.24%.

Shutterstock is a digital content marketplace that licenses stock photos, videos, music, illustrations and AI-powered creative assets to businesses, advertisers and media companies.

Getty Images is a visual media company focused on editorial photography, stock images, video and archival content for newsrooms, brands and publishers.

Merger Collapse Pressures Shares

According to a Form 8-K filing, Getty’s board unanimously resolved not to proceed with the sale of Shutterstock’s editorial business required by U.K. regulators and instead plans to terminate the merger agreement following the extended July 6 deadline, assuming circumstances do not materially change.

The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority had conditioned merger approval on Shutterstock divesting its editorial business. Getty said it was not required to accept that condition under the merger agreement.

Getty and Shutterstock first announced their merger in January 2025 in a deal valued at approximately $3.7 billion. The combination was intended to create a larger visual content company with greater scale to compete in the rapidly evolving AI-driven media market.

Getty also said it intends to retain a financial advisor to evaluate strategic financing alternatives.

The potential collapse of the merger comes as both companies face rising competitive pressure from AI image generation platforms offering cheaper and faster content creation tools.

Trading Metrics

Shutterstock has a market capitalization of approximately $512.50 million.

The stock has traded between a 52-week high of $29.50 and a 52-week low of $12.69.

Over the past 12 months, SSTK shares have declined approximately 30.60%.

Benzinga Edge Stock Rankings indicate negative short-term, medium-term and long-term price trends.

Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.

Photo: KVN1777/Shutterstock