Some dedicated Palm Pre fanboys/Pre Central readers did a bit of snooping around and found a model number for a North American, GSM Palm Pre in the certification database for Wi-Fi.org. Intrigue!
The model number on this new Pre on the Wi-Fi.org site reads P100UNA (where as the Euro GSM version reads P100UEU and the CDMA version reads P100EWW). There are also references in the Bluetooth Gadget Guide and TUVdotCOM to back this up.
Engadget seems to have the right idea in guessing that this phone is first heading to Bell and our friendly neighbors to the north (that's Canada, for the directionally challenged). Why, you ask? Because Bell is in the process of switching from a CDMA network to a GSM one, and Sprint is the still the exclusive carrier of the Pre in the US for at least the rest of the year. Then again, maybe Palm is just really, REALLY excited about early 2010. [Wi-Fi.org (PDF) via PreCentral via Engadget