ANALYSIS-Motorola's Droid to help Verizon, hurt RIM & Palm

* Shoppers seen gravitating to Droid this holiday season

* Droid gains seen at expense of BlackBerry, Palm

* iPhone expected to stay strong

* Smartphone subsidies likely to hurt carriers' Q4 margins

By Sinead Carew

NEW YORK, Nov 23 (Reuters) - As U.S. consumers compile their holiday shopping lists, Motorola Inc's (MOT.N) Droid smartphone is expected to feature prominently, at the expense of Palm Inc's (PALM.O) Pre and Research In Motion Ltd's (RIM.TO) BlackBerry.

Heavy marketing by Verizon Wireless will help sales of what Motorola hopes is its comeback phone, though the Droid will still lag by far the total sales of BlackBerry or Apple Inc's (AAPL.O) iPhone, analysts say.

U.S. market leader Verizon Wireless, owned by Verizon Communications Inc (VZ.N) and Vodafone Group Plc (VOD.L), is also looking for a bit of a comeback itself, having lost market share in the third quarter to iPhone carrier AT&T Inc (T.N).