Possibly related anecdote: In September/October I was shopping for flights to SYD (for March),and the cash and award miles prices for the IAH flight were significantly higher than for the SFO/LAX options on the same dates. Then Qantas announced it would be re-starting its DFW-MEL in December. Within 2 weeks of the announcement, both the cash and miles prices for the IAH-SYD flight I was watching dropped to levels commensurate with the LAX and SFO options -- in the case of miles, it was a drop from 360k for one-way J to 200k. I realize many, many factors go into both revenue and award ticket pricing, so my story may reflect a coincidence of timing. And I don't know how UA was competing with Qantas for Texas-based flights prior to the pandemic. But perhaps the IAH- SYD route lost some of its comparative advantage for UA once flights out of DFW increased -- another reason why they might feel they can make better use of their widebodies elsewhere.