The government owns a 20 percent stake in United Airlines, which is set to exit bankruptcy very soon. The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation that holds that stock is trying to sell half of it in the next couple of days, reports the New York Times.

The agency ended up as a creditor in the bankruptcy and ended up with a good chunk of the airlines stock because it will have to pay about two-thirds of the airline’s pensions. The company shed that liability when it went into bankruptcy.

The rest of the pensions will go unpaid because they exceed the maximum the government will guarantee. Of course, the government is selling on the hope that the market has developed in recent weeks that the outlook for the airline business is looking better with lower capacity and higher fares. Time will tell.