The rumor mill is swirling as Facebook prepares to go public.

According to ZDNet’s Emil Protinski, a previously reported date of May 18th could be delayed, as the Securities and Exchange Commission has yet to approve Facebook’s IPO filing after their sixth amendment late last week. Early reports of the public offering cited an FTC probe could be cause for delay.

ZDNet is citing CNBC reporter Julia Boorstin, who gave the news on air and tweeted the story afterwards:

@JBoorstin
Julia BoorstinFacebook says May 18 IPO is uncertain pending SEC approval of S-1. Roadshow meeting over, mobile, ads in focus. #facebookipo 2 days ago via Twitter for BlackBerry® ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

Protalinski cites several rumors that the stock would be made available to the public late this week, or as late as May 24th. In other words no one knows what is going to happen until they make a public announcement.

Bloomberg has reported that Facebook will finish taking IPO orders tomorrow. This certainly seems like they will be going public in the very near future. According their sources, Facebook initially planned to finish taking IPO orders on May 17th. This points to the fact that, if anything, Facebook is ahead of schedule.

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Just because the SEC hasn’t declared the filing effective, doesn’t necessarily mean the IPO is going to be delayed. They have been sitting on the filing for more than a month now, so expect an announcement that it has been signed off on within the week. When that happens, you know that the announcement for a public offering will made soon after. Until then, it’s all speculation, but a Friday launch date does seem likely.