CEOs need to identify new sources of value creation, one of which has been hiding in plain sight: the value that comes from changes in the supply and demand of capital, goods, and services. Most companies don’t know how to extract that value, and these opportunity losses add up.

Imagine a steel manufacturer that neglects to benefit from short-term price hikes by reselling already-procured power. Or a semiconductor manufacturer that fails to redirect production to serve an industry in which a competitor is struggling to meet demand. In such cases, traditional companies can neither reorient and fully optimize their complex supply chains amid changing market prices nor react swiftly to external shocks. This leaves money on the table.

We refer to this cumulative opportunity for industrial companies as “dark value,” because, as with dark matter in physics, we can see the effects of this value (in trading profits and lost opportunities) but can’t measure it directly. But by analyzing these effects, we’ve quantified the value across multiple industries. A handful of industries are already adept at capturing dark value, but most are still in early stages or have yet to start. Companies in these industries are missing out on $10 billion to $280 billion annually. (See Exhibit 1.)