100% this. Makes absolutely no sense other than for them to be able to say "well we don't have a notch any more".This I don't understand.
To me, the space above the cutout is useless so surely this method actually consumes MORE screen real estate than the notch? It's hard to tell from renders I admit but at best it's going to be the same.
I'd they had just shifted the module north by 5mm or so then great but now you have some utterly pointless pixels above the new "notch"? Idiocy.