A company is experiencing latency problems connecting to the cloud. Which of the following should an administrator check FIRST?

The ARP table maps IP addresses to MAC addresses at the gateway, and a stale or incorrect ARP entry can cause packets destined for the cloud to be forwarded to the wrong next-hop device, directly introducing latency or misdirection. Verifying ARP entries is a quick, low-level check at the Layer 2/3 boundary that rules out a fundamental forwarding issue before investigating higher-level causes. Correcting an incorrect ARP entry ensures packets reach the proper gateway and begin traversing the correct path to the cloud.

Excessive broadcast traffic primarily impacts local LAN performance and is not a typical root cause of latency on routed paths to cloud services.

Bandwidth utilization is a relevant check but is a higher-level investigation performed after ruling out routing and Layer 2 forwarding issues.

Incorrect subnetting typically causes a complete loss of connectivity rather than intermittent latency symptoms.