Ryan agreed, saying the bigger concern for Apple is whether it wants to sell more devices or would prefer to sell fewer devices and keep its profit margin somewhat higher. "It depends some on what Wall Street investors think," he added. By extension, if Wall Street believes buyers in a recession might want to pay less, that could favor selling the iPhone with multiple carriers.

There is some value aside from profits on sales in staying with AT&T, Ryan added. Working with AT&T gives Apple the ability to pressure AT&T to provision certain features and applications. "If and when Apple moves to other carriers, they may not be able to get that kind of leverage on features, since they have turned their marketing strategy into a volume sales play," Ryan said.

Now that Apple faces so many smartphone competitors with more to come, including , selling the iPhone with other carriers might lessen its value simply because the other carriers have respectable alternatives, Ryan said. "Apple might lose some market leverage if it went nonexclusive," he said.