When we rang Santa and asked him if he'd kindly give us the scoop on his corporate Christmas list as he did a year ago, the CEO of Christmas bashfully confessed that he hasn't had time to compile his list. Something about having to call his broker before the deadline for tax-loss selling of his $99 shares of Nortel Networks.

"I've asked Johnny Roth, Frankie Dunn (CEOs of Nortel Christmas pasts) and Billy Owens (CEO of Christmas present) to respectfully return their train sets," piped the jolly elf, his face flushed with embarrassment, his nose turning redder than Rudolph's over his Nortel-weighted portfolio.

"If you can make the corporate list for me this year, the flaming rum punches are on me. Just remember one thing. With coal prices going through the chimney, we can't afford to give naughty CEOs coal this year. But if you want to muck the stalls in the reindeer barn for the corporate hitlist, be my guest.”

On that cheery note, here's the corporate giftlist we've provided Santa with:

* To Santa, a long chat with the world's greatest investor, Warren Buffett.

* To Frankie and Johnny (Dunn & Roth), 1999.

* To the Nortel board of directors, a book to curl up with - Corporate Governance For Dummies.

* To Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, a racy tech stock for his humdrum brown-suit portfolio.

* To analysts who still think Nortel is a buy, a truth serum.

* To Rogers Communications kingpin Ted Rogers, a professional baseball team.

* To Gordon Nixon, CEO of Royal Bank, whose customers endured eight days of transaction headaches this year, Spybot (the free virus cleaner).

* To Air Canada tub- thumper Celine Dion, a new set of luggage - or the number to the lost-luggage hotline.

* To locked-out National Hockey League players, shares in an NHL franchise (a super investment, gang, just ask your union boss Bob Goodenow).

* To NHL commish Gary Bettman, an easy read - Hockey For Dummies.

* To Eric Molson, Ian Molson and the rest of the Molson family, a family reunion (no glass beer bottles, please).

* To airline sparring partners Clive Beddoe (WestJet) and Robert Milton (Air Canada), a cage match - best two out of three.

* To WestJet CEO Beddoe, a cure for insomnia - Milton's book, Straight From The Top: The Truth About Air Canada.

* To Microsoft chairman Bill Gates, four million e-mails a day. Oh, he already gets that many. OK, four million more.

* To starry-eyed goldbugs, thousand-dollar-per-ounce gold (so they can get that huge chip off their shoulders).

* To goldbug John Ing, president of Maison Placements, same as the last two years - $510 gold (his annual target price).

* To Gregory Wilkins, CEO of Barrick Gold, a vanishing hedgebook.

* To classy oilman and Calgary Flames part-owner Harley Hotchkiss, a publisher - for a book on proper corporate governance and how to give back to the community.

* To Conrad Black, a Christmas Eve boardroom meeting - with Ebenezer Scrooge's Ghost of Christmas Past.

* To money-grubbing CEOs who don't give enough back, a visit to homeless shelters.

* To articulate rookie Shell Canada CEO Clive Mather, a soapbox - so he can lecture oilpatch CEOs on media- relations savvy.

* To Paramount Energy Trust CEO Susan Riddell Rose, a front-row seat at a media relations seminar.

* To oilman and marathon man George Fink, a showdown - against Clive Mather.

* To Tim Hearn and the posse at the Imperial Oil office that is moving from Toronto to Calgary, Gunsmoke reruns - so they can get acclimatized to our Dodge City lifestyle.

* To Forzani Group CEO Bob Sartor, a calendar (to keep track of those killer changing seasons that play havoc with sales).

* To Antrim Energy (AEN), one of the disasters on the TSX this year, a new ticker symbol that doesn't remind investors of Enron (also AEN before it was delisted).

* To Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, $100 trillion US or so to pay off the ballooning U.S. trade deficit.

* To Bill Comrie, former owner of The Brick, a well-deserved Christmas toast (from Brick staff who received $40 million in bonus cheques when the company went public as an income trust).

* To investors who backed up the truck on those coal mining stocks before they went into orbit, a Brink's truck.

* To Don Cherry, spokesman for upstart Alberta company CV Technologies, a Cold-fX commercial.

* To financially strapped former Ottawa Senators owner Rod Bryden, the 2005 CEO comeback-of-the-year award.

* To former Biovail CEO Eugene Melnyk, nothing (compensation $63.2 million in '03 from a company with a tanking share price ought to be enough).

* To Paul Tellier, the former CEO of Canadian National Railway who is now running a splitting headache named Bombardier, a new train set.

* To John Bitove, CEO of Priszm Canadian Income Fund, blond hair and a new toy (ie. pro sports franchise).

* To New York attorney general and Wall Street corporate trash collector Eliot Spitzer, more handcuffs for Wall Street's crooks.

* To Martha Stewart, who is serving a five-month prison sentence for lying about a stock sale, a new stock broker.

* To Heather Reisman, CEO of Indigo Books & Music, a video - You've Got Mail!

* To Donald Trump, a pink slip.

* To all, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

(Gyle Konotopetz is counting his many holiday blessings at gyle@businessedge.ca)