For 25 years, Steven Halpern, editor of TheStockAdvisors.com, has surveyed the leading financial newsletter advisors asking for their favorite stocks for the coming year. This article is one of 100+ ideas in the Best Stocks for 2008 report.

"We have chosen Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO) as our favorite for 2008," says Jim Farrish, editor of Sector Exchange.

"Looking into 2008, one area we like is technology, and one of the stronger sub sectors has been the internet. It is important to note the build-out of the internet is not done. Content is still being created at a rate no one can fathom and technological advances continue to explode.

"This brave new world comes with the ability to provide internet video downloading at a rate that will excite and attract users like never before. Why? First, the ability to increasingly compress data and more effectively use bandwidth and second, the expanding infrastructure of the internet.

"While the sector has struggled since the negative Cisco earnings announcement in November, we see opportunity in this downward move. If we consider the reason for the decline, we find it wasn't fundamental; it was judgmental.

"John Chambers, Cisco's chairman and CEO, stated to the media in November 2007 that he believed sales would slow in one of Cisco's seven primary lines of business, that being their financial services area. (Wow, now that had to be a shock to Wall Street, after all banks and brokerage firms were melting down faster than butter in a frying pan.)

"Thus, in the era of Sarbanes-Oxley reporting, he did the prudent thing and voiced his concerns. Remember, this is only one area of business for Cisco. Our question is: Can revenues and earnings take a 20% hit? That's why the stock has been discounted as a result of Chamber's comments, not to mention the ripple effect to the technology sector as a whole.

"Our outlook is for Cisco to recover this discount built into the stock in 2008 and potentially move even higher as the build out of internet infrastructure continues. Technically, we see support in the $25 range currently and resistance in the $29 range. This could put the stock back in the trading range it was in prior to breaking out in June 2007.

"From a long-term perspective, the company has a fundamentally strong balance sheet as well as P/L statement. We pick it as one of the winners for 2008. We would accumulate shares in the $25-29 range with a target of $38 over the next year. To manage the risk of the position we would use a stop at $24."