By Steven Russolillo

Scott Eells/Bloomberg

The high stakes public relations battle over the biggest corporate stock listing in recent memory is about to come to a head.

Social-media giant Facebook appears ready to file papers as early as next week for its coming IPO. In the expected SEC documents, the company should announce whether it has chosen the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq as its primary stock listing.

UPDATE: Investors shouldn’t hold their breath on an official announcement coming in the S-1 filing. Companies often file documents without language relating to who they’ve chosen as their primary exchange. While an official announcement could come in next week’s IPO documents, it’s not 100% certain.

2nd UPDATE: Joe Christinat, vice president of communications at Nasdaq, just sent some additional info. There are 231 companies that that have recently filed S-1 documents and are prepping to public. Among that total, 25 haven’t indicated which exchange they will choose for their primary listing, while the rest have picked either NYSE, Amex or Nasdaq.

Both U.S. stock exchanges have been at war with each other over listings for as long as anyone can remember. The intensity picked up quite in 2011 amid the wave of Internet listings, such as LinkedIn and Groupon.

NYSE had some early success in 2011. Its top grabs included LinkedIn, Pandora and Chinese social-networking site Renren. But Nasdaq came back with a vengeance and landed Groupon, Zynga and the Expedia-spinoff TripAdvisor, among others.

Both stock exchanges have battled for years to bring in, or poach, listings by offering promotions and other incentives. Groupon was an especially big win for Nasdaq. Here’s what colleagues Brendan Conway and Jacob Bunge reported back in October:

Perhaps the courtship of Groupon best illustrates the exchanges’ tug of war: The competition for the listing, initiated last spring, drew the chief executives of both exchange groups to the daily deals website’s home base of Chicago. NYSE’s Duncan Niederauer and Nasdaq OMX’s Bob Greifeld both personally pitched their markets in June, according to people familiar with the matter.

The exchange operators outlined a slew of promotions and co-branding opportunities with other companies listed on their markets. Nasdaq secured victory by agreeing to raise visibility of Groupon’s discount offers across a range of media, including the 72-foot billboard on its MarketSite in New York’s Times Square, according to people familiar with the matter.

If both exchanges went to those lengths to court Groupon, one can only imagine what they’ve done to woo Facebook.

It’s unclear at the moment which exchange Facebook has chosen, or if an official decision has even been made. Representatives from both exchanges weren’t immediately available for comment, according to Dow Jones editor Brendan Intindola. Representatives from NYSE and Nasdaq declined to comment.

An NYSE representative declined to comment.

In addition to traditional market-quality issues such as liquidity and bid-ask spreads, so-called visibility issues now play a key part in the listing equation.

Promotional efforts to raise corporate profiles, including events like the NYSE’s or Nasdaq’s opening and closing bell ceremonies, largely factor into a company’s decisions on where to list its stock. Cost is also a big factor determining where companies choose to list.

So, MarketBeaters, who’s going to be the big winner in the Facebook sweepstakes: NYSE or Nasdaq?