Hi @feteguru - in regards to ST1, they received a "speeding ticket" from the ASX on December 20th, and their response (lodged on that date) included the following:

"The Company is aware of a single buyer which appears to have acquired a significant portion of shares, which in the Company’s view appears to be the main reason for the movement in price and volume. The Company also notes that in accordance with its announced strategy it continues to evaluate and conduct due diligence on potential acquisition targets. Those due diligence exercises are at varying stages and may or may not result in binding terms being agreed for those potential targets in the future. The Company will advise the market accordingly if such acquisitions are agreed."

Source: Response-to-Price-Query.PDF [20-Dec-2023]

That single buyer was/is Shan Kanji's 263 Finance - see here: Becoming-a-substantial-holder.PDF [dated 21-Dec-2023] ...who now holds around 15.9% of ST1.

Regal Funds are now below 5%, so have ceased to be substantial holders - see here: Disclosure-of-Long-Equity-Derivative-Positions.PDF [22-Dec-2023] [effective date: 21-Dec-2023]

To be clear, the Zambezi Absolute Return Fund, which is mentioned in that notice from Regal Funds Management, is a hedge fund operated by Regal Funds Management and has approximately $236 million in assets (according to their own website).

Further Reading:

Shan Kanji | LinkedIn

Shan Kanji : Positions, Relations & Network - MarketScreener

Shan Kanji is also the Chairman of ASX-listed Atturra Ltd (ATA.asx) and owns 54.58% of Atturra's shares on issue (SOI).

ASX ATA: Atturra finalises $57m Cirrus Networks acquisition to help it take on Accenture, IBM (afr.com) [12-Dec-2023]

It would appear that Shan Kanji's purchase of 15.9% of Spirit Techonology through his (Shan Kanji's) company, 263 Finance Pty Ltd, is the main reason for the ST1 share price increase.

Meanwhile Spirit Technology is saying they are involved in M&A discussions which are not yet at a stage where they are required to disclose anything further about those discussions to us (via the ASX announcements platform), so speculation/knowledge around those discussions and the significance of them could also be playing a part. As always they stress that those discussions may not result in anything binding being agreed to or otherwise progressed to a stage where they need to tell us about them - the reality is that many such discussions don't ever eventuate in anything of substance occurring.

It would be good to know what Shan's up to though...

While this sort of share price rise - from 4 cps to 8 cps (+100%) is worth investigating...

It should also be viewed in the context of where the ST1 share price has come from:

At 8 cps (cents per share), ST1 are up +100% on where they were in September (2023), but they are also still 80% below where they were 3 years ago.