It would appear that some incorrect information was conveyed, both by myself and by Portalarium, regarding the release date of Shroud of the Avatar. In a comment on yesterday’s news, Richard Garriott himself sets the record straight:

SORRY, there is an important mis-communication / understanding in what is being interpreted from our docs. We are releasing the STORY content in July. The shipping of the full game is expected LATER in the year, TBD.

Sorry for the confusion!
– Richard Garriott

And, indeed, the SeedInvest page has been edited a bit to better reflect the expected release timeline for Shroud of the Avatar:

We believe that our prior earnings and cash flows are not indicative of future earnings and cash flows. The software is currently in development and expected to launch between July and November 2017 at which point sales are expected to increase.

So, there you have it: the story of Shroud of the Avatar should be essentially complete by July of this year, but there will be several additional months of work put into the game thereafter; Portalarium appear to be targeting November as the actual release date.