¡¡¡¡SAN FRANCISCO, May 3 (Xinhua) -- Social networking giant Facebook on Thursday said it plans to price its initial public offering (IPO) at 28 to 35 U.S. dollars a share, putting it on track to become the largest IPO for any Internet company.

¡¡¡¡Facebook announced the preliminary price range in its latest filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

¡¡¡¡The company also said that it is offering 337.4 million shares to sell, with more than half from selling stockholders.

¡¡¡¡The estimated pricing would value Facebook at 96 billion dollars at the high end and could help the company raise as much as13.6 billion dollars, according to The Wall Street Journal.

¡¡¡¡The numbers would put Facebook just behind the market capitalization of Amazon.com and ahead of other technology giants like Hewlett-Packard (HP), the newspaper said in a report.

¡¡¡¡The social networking company is now likely only about two weeks away from a final pricing and the first trading of its shares on the Nasdaq market, with its roadshow set to start next Monday.