Assuming I found the same auction as you, (I only found one for a Macy's Lionel boxcar with "2007" in the description) it's the same car.
Link
The only difference would likely be the price sticker Macy's put on the back of the orange box for cars sold in Macy's last year. Obviously, cars shipped to Lionel dealers would not have this. I would also suspect perhaps there is not a single car sized shipping carton this year, as once this became regular production, they probably would do a more standard 3 per case configuration.
The item # is the same (6-25043). Lionel put this car in their January 2007 catalog.
Also, you can bet that if it were a new uncataloged car that wasn't widely known about yet, it would not have a "buy it now" of 39.99. ;)
Hope this helped
-Dave
Regards, Roy
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