Apple may sell 17 million units in 2008

17 million units in 2008, 25 million in 2009 for the iPhone....

Shebly Seyrafi, an analyst with Caris & Co., this morning raised his price target for Apple (AAPL) to $115 from $110, asserting that iPod sales in the June quarter should be up from the March quarter. Seyrafi says he now sees iPod units in the quarter growing to 11.9 million units from 10.5 million in Q1; his previous forecast called for a decline to 10 million units.

Seyrafi says his checks come from the hard-disk market, which means strong demand for the video iPod, which he says is between a quarter and a third of total iPod shipments.

Seyrafi notes that there continues to be speculation that Apple will switch some video iPods to NAND flash later this year.

Meanwhile, Seyrafi says Apple’s recent warning that gross margins will decline from 35% in the first quarter to 32% in the second quarter due to more stable NAND pricing could be conservative. He notes that NAND pricing “has been more aggressive in the past few weeks.”

He also sees upside for the iPhone, and suggests that his already startling numbers could be too low. Seyrafi expects 17 million units in fiscal 2008 and 25 million in fiscal 2009 - remember that Apple CEO Steve Jobs had predicted getting to 1% global market share, or about 10 million phones, in the first year.

Seyrafi raised EPS estimates to $3.52 from $3.43 for the September 2007 fiscal year; to $3.73 from $3.54 for ‘08, and to $4.42 from $4.21 for ‘09.

Apple shares, which jumped $3.11 yesterday on very little news, this morning was down fractionally in early trading.

Source