The Sprint EVO 4G is selling very well, even if it isn’t selling as well as Sprint previously stated.  Sprint today said that it had misstated the original numbers by adding an extra 3x in its original statement.

Sprint said on Tuesday the total number of HTC EVO 4G devices sold on the launch day was in line with the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices sold over their first three days on the market combined.

“We originally reported that the total number of HTC EVO 4G devices sold on launch day was three times the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices sold over their first three days on the market combined.

So, for the sake of argument, let’s say Sprint sold 50,000 Pres and 50,000 Instincts on each of their first three days on the market.  That’s 150,000 Pres and 150,000 Insticts.  300,000 total which is translated into EVO’s first day sales.   Or it could be they sold half that many.  25,000 Pres and Instincts  and  150,000 EVOs on the first day.

That’s the model one analyst used:

BTIG analyst Walter Piecyk said he was cutting his estimate for EVO sales in the first weekend to 150,000 from his prior estimate of 250,000 to 300,000.

“Furthermore, our calls to 20 plus stores today indicate that the phone is in short supply, so we do not expect that number to rise significantly in the first week of sales.”

It is still impressive to me that Sprint sold a multiple of six times their previous best sellers, and they still can’t keep any inventory.  That was never a problem with the Pre or Instinct.

The old statement had them selling a multiple of 18.  Which rightly seemed too high.

It would be a whole lot easier if Sprint would just release real numbers instead of having everyone playing guessing games, especially when the riddles they provide aren’t correctly worded in the first place.