"The smart move in today's market is to stick with companies that are growing right through the recession, such as WMS Industries (NYSE: WMS)," says Mark Skousen.

In his trading oriented service, The Hedge Fund Trader Alert, he explains, "Based in Waukegan, Ill., WMS designs, manufactures, leases and sells gaming machines and video lottery terminals to its customers, the casino operators.

"Earnings at WMS have climbed by at least 24% the past 11 quarters. And they're still accelerating. Most recent quarterly results were up 36% on rising revenue. What's going on here? WMS is a great innovator. And it knows its business.

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.

"My top speculative idea for 2008 is International Game Technology (NYSE: IGT)," says Paul Tracy, editor of StreetAuthority Market Advisor.

"IGT is the world's leading slot machine manufacturer. In addition to basic slot machine design and sales, the company generates more than half of its revenues by leasing machines to casinos in exchange for a percentage of the net win.

"This gaming business provides the firm with a recurring stream of high-margin revenues. Thanks to steady expansion in recent years, IGT now draws income from about 60,000 machines installed throughout casinos in key gaming markets across the globe.

"With deep pockets and steady cash flows, the company has been able to spend nearly twice as much on research and development activities as its closest competitors. In a recent poll conducted by Casino Player magazine, seven of the top ten most popular video slots were introduced by IGT.

"Since the first 'one-armed bandit' was introduced in the late 1800s, slot machines have become a thriving multi-billion dollar global industry," says says Nathan Slaughter. "And International Game Technology (NYSE: IGT) is the '800-pound gorilla' in the slot machine industry" he explains in his Half-Priced Stocks.

And while he notes that the earliest slot machines were crude mechanical devices, the latest are "technological marvels," equipped with rich high-resolution plasma monitors, stereo surround-sound speakers, live streaming video, and other features.

And looking ahead, Slaughter explains, there are other exciting developments on the horizon to look forward to -- such as server-based gaming, where entire banks of slot machines connected to a central server can be reconfigured instantly.

In Nevada, he notes, slot revenues surpassed those generated by blackjack and other table games in 1981 and never looked back. Last year, he observes, they accounted for 66% of total casino revenues statewide.