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@M_V
The stem on the blue bike looks like the clamp halves are bottomed out against each other which could suggest overtightening or a mismatch in diameters.
I see though that your bars are marked as being 26.0mm so should be the correct fit if the stems are 26.0. It seems particularly unlikely that the stem is available in 2 clamp sizes and that you and the owner of the blue bike both have mismatches in the opposite way.
Could your groove be corrosion? The faceplate bolts look a bit crusty so could the bike have seen some prolonged turbo use with sweat collecting in the join between stem and bars?