His numbers were bullish: Estimates for the weekend by the most aggressive Wall Street analysts had topped out at 6 million, with many lower than that.

Last year, Apple said it in the first three days.

While demand for the iPhone 5 may be higher than expected, there have been reports, as White acknowledged, of problems at Sharp, one of the three suppliers of the smartphone's display module.

The iPhone 5 relies on not only a larger screen than its predecessors, but uses "in-cell" technology, which does away with a separate touch-sensitive layer under the glass and instead integrates sensors into the liquid-crystal display (LCD) itself.

"I've felt that, on the display, Apple should be pretty caught up sometime in early 2013," said White when asked to predict when supply and demand would be in balance. "The display manufacturers should hit their yields in November or December."