US stocks give up sharp gains

Wall Street finished only slightly higher in an erratic session today as investors remained unconvinced by a Federal Reserve plan to work with other central banks to alleviate the global credit crisis.

Investors erased a 272-point gain in the Dow Jones industrial average that followed the Fed’s announcement of an agreement with the European Central Bank and the central banks of England, Canada and Switzerland to confront what it called elevated pressures in the credit markets. The Fed said it will create a temporary auction facility to make funds available to banks and set up lines of credit with the European and Swiss central banks for additional resources.