Probably not to an IRA at 55, although a plan could allow that.Here is a pasted article from Principal Financial.

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Statutory Diversification
Although ESOPs are designed to be
primarily invested in employer securities,
participants nearing retirement need to
be able to diversify their ESOP accounts
to minimize investment risk. To that end,
ESOP participants who have attained age
55 and completed 10 years of
participation are allowed a six-year
window to diversify up to 25% of their
share account balance in the first five
years. They may diversify an additional
25% in the final year of this six-year
window, for a total of 50%.6 This is the
statutory diversification rule, but ESOP
sponsors may permissively allow
participants to diversify more liberally.
A detailed discussion of the diversification
provisions is beyond the scope of this
article, but generally speaking, plan
sponsors can satisfy the diversification
rules by: (1) allowing participants to
receive a distribution of the diversifiable
amount, which they may then invest in
other investments, (2) provide three
alternative investment options within the
ESOP with different risk characteristics, or
(3) allow the participant to transfer the
diversifiable amount into another qualified
retirement plan sponsored by the
employer that provides three suitable
alternative investment options. Practically
speaking, most ESOP sponsors
accommodate the diversification rules by
providing ESOP participants with the
opportunity to transfer the amount they
can elect to diversify to another qualified
plan (e.g., a 401(k) plan), rather than
providing a distribution.
However the diversification is
accomplished, once the participant has
elected to diversify out of employer
securities, the plan sponsor is not
required to offer the participant an inkind
distribution for the amount already
diversified pursuant to the statutory
diversification rules.
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