What Happened?
Shares of visual content marketplace Getty Images (NYSE:GETY) fell 2.3% in the afternoon session after JPMorgan initiated coverage on the company with an Underweight rating, according to Streetinsider. An Underweight rating indicates that the investment firm expects the stock to underperform relative to the broader market or its sector coverage. Bearish coverage initiations from prominent Wall Street institutions often weigh on investor sentiment, signaling caution regarding a company's outlook. The negative rating prompted selling pressure as market participants reacted to the firm's cautious assessment.
The shares were trading at $0.26, down 3% from the previous close.
The stock market overreacts to news, and big price drops can present good opportunities to buy high-quality stocks. Is now the time to buy Getty Images? Access our full analysis report here, it’s free.
What Is The Market Telling Us
Getty Images’s shares are extremely volatile and have had 77 moves greater than 5% over the last year. In that context, today’s move indicates the market considers this news meaningful but not something that would fundamentally change its perception of the business.
The biggest move we wrote about over the last year was 3 months ago when the stock gained 78.3% on the news that the company announced a multi-year partnership with OpenAI to integrate its licensed image library into ChatGPT. This deal completely reframed the investment thesis for Getty Images. Over the previous two years, the market treated the stock as a primary casualty of the generative AI boom, a fear compounded when Getty lost its high-profile copyright infringement lawsuit against Stable Diffusion creator Stability AI in November 2025. By partnering with OpenAI, Getty is securing a new distribution channel and monetizing its vast archive in the AI era. Under the agreement, ChatGPT will pull from Getty's licensed catalog when users request visual responses, providing OpenAI with high-quality, legally cleared imagery. While financial terms were not disclosed, the sheer magnitude of the stock's move shows investors were pricing in a lifeline for a business model that many feared was structurally obsolete. The rally was further supported by recent renewals of exclusive photography deals for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the Tribeca Festival, securing high-demand recurring content.
Getty Images is down 80% since the beginning of the year, and at $0.26 per share, it is trading 88.9% below its 52-week high of $2.36 from October 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Getty Images’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at only $26.68.
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