The government shutdown is threatening to disrupt the re-emerging initial public offering (IPO) market, including the highly anticipated Twitter IPO.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the agency that reviews IPO plans, is using carryover funds left over from the last fiscal year that ended Sept. 30. But that money may run out in a few weeks, prompting the SEC to shutter, according to USA Today.

That's just about when Twitter is hoping to have its IPO. It's hard to say how the shutdown will impact the Twitter IPO, since the company has already filed a confidential prospectus with the SEC. The prospectus is expected to be released to the public soon.

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The potential shutdown would come at a time when the IPO market is just beginning to take off.

"The SEC is already busy with the busy IPO calendar," Kathleen Smith of Renaissance Capital, an IPO fund manager, told USA Today. "We have a vibrant IPO market. It's a shame to have something that would slow things down further."

By Renaissance Capital's count, 152 companies have offered shares to the public for the first time, a 54 percent increase over the same time last year, USA Today reported. At that rate, it would be the busiest year for IPOs since 2007, when there were 213 IPOs.

Only key SEC units, including those needed to keep securities filings available to the public, will remain open after the agency runs out of funds.

"I'm guessing they will find ways to selectively approve the budget to allow vital functions to continue," Smith told USA Today.

How much a company's IPO schedule will be affected depends on how far along the IPO is in the process, David Lynn, a partner with law firm Morrison & Foerster, told Forbes.

"If the company is towards the end of the process and trying to price its transactions, it presents a lot of uncertainty and potential difficulties," explained Lynn, former chief counsel at the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance.

If the SEC shuts down, he said, "no one can look at the final versions of the registration statement, and that has to happen before they can price and sell securities."

On the other hand, companies earlier in the IPO process would see less of an impact since they were ready to wait for the SEC for two to three months anyway, Lynn noted.

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