WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve is taking new steps to ease the credit crises, including increasing the amount of money it will auction to banks this month to $100 billion.

The Federal Reserve says it will make two moves to increase liquidity in the credit markets.

First, it will increase the size of its March 10 and 24 auctions to banks to $50 billion each. The auctions had been set for $30 billion apiece. Fed officials say they are prepared to move to even larger amounts at future auctions if necessary.

The Fed also says that, starting Friday, it will begin a series of repurchase transactions expected to reach $100 billion.